


For Gallifrey and the Lady President

by JaneTurenne



Series: Time and Again [4]
Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Gallifrey (Big Finish Audio)
Genre: Bechdel Test Pass, F/M, Women Being Awesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-07
Updated: 2011-04-08
Packaged: 2017-10-17 17:47:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 78,168
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/179555
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JaneTurenne/pseuds/JaneTurenne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Time War ended in the destruction of two races and the rending of time itself.  But it began with intrigue, with friendship, with insight, with misunderstanding, with courage, with mistakes, with struggle, with striving, and with love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Echoes

**Author's Note:**

> Sequel to [A Time For Every Purpose](http://archiveofourown.org/works/143216). Many beta thanks to blackletter. Time and Again has always belonged to agapi42, and so it does still.

"Coordinator Narvin..."

"Five microspans, metal dog."

"Mistress Romana is scheduled for a meeting with the Ambassador from Unvoss, Coordinator."

"The Ambassador from Unvoss just left, K-9."

"Affirmative. But the Madam President stated this morning that she would require every free moment of her day to prepare for her speech to the public this afternoon."

"She can spare five microspans."

"She has only five microspans before her appointment with..."

"Then she has five microspans. Let me _in_ , you power-mad little machine."

"Negative, Coordinator. And insults are not necessary."

"K-9, are you or are you not programmed to comprehend the social interactions of organic lifeforms?"

"Affirmative."

"Including Time Lords?"

"My databanks include information concerning the instinctive social behavior and complex societal mores of every known intelligent species in this universe."

"Then it is not beyond your capacity to comprehend my relationship with the Lady President? For example, you are no doubt aware that a Time Lord and Time Lady who..."

Romana's office door slides open, and her voice drifts over from the other side of the room. "Stop arguing with the dog and come here. _Now_."

"Thank Rassilon," Narvin mutters, hurrying to comply. "I hardly fancied explaining...what was that phrase of yours?...'the birds and the bees' to your computer in any case."

"Bird," says K-9's voice. "Noun. Any feathered vertebrate animal; a member of..."

The door slides shut again, drowning out K-9's artificial voice. Romana already has her arms around Narvin, kissing him urgently, by the time K-9's last syllable hits his ears.

"This is becoming absurd, Narvin," she mumbles, in fragments, between one kiss and the next.

"I entirely agree."

"It's been two weeks."

"Seventeen days," he corrects.

"Seventeen days," she agrees.

"We have four microspans."

"Four microspans isn't enough for one proper _kiss_ , Narvin, much less anything more."

"Shall we test that theory?"

"No, we shall not. I've waited seventeen days. I'm not going to settle for anything less than your full attention."

"You have my full attention, Romana. You have every single inch of my attention."

"For the next eighty nanospans. Then you _and_ your attention will have to be the Coordinator again, and I'll have to be the untouchable Lady President."

"I have a great deal of respect for the Lady President." He bends her back into an exceptionally deep kiss, supporting her back as he bows forwards, their bodies forming inverse arches, tucked close against each other. "One might even call me her willing slave. If she continues to take up so much of my Romana's time, however, I may have a hard time liking her very much."

"You never did like me very much. And don't blame me for the nonstop pace. Areliane is high and mighty Keeper of the Schedule."

"The day when you let anyone else be in charge of your life..."

"Fair enough," Romana admits. "If I bully her hard enough, I'm sure I can get her to clear my evening after, say, ten bells tonight..."

"Nine." She nips at his lips, and nearly distracts him with a very clever trick of the tongue. But he's a man with his priorities in order. "Make it nine, Romana."

"Mistress," sounds K-9's voice, over the intercom, "Lord Matthias here to see you."

"Early," groans Romana. "Of course. Just a moment, K-9."

"That's my cue," Narvin sighs. Romana steals one more quick, firm kiss, and then steps back, straightening her robes, as he does the same to his own. "Nine, Romana."

"You'll be here?"

He smiles, and presses the door control, nodding to Matthias in Romana's antechamber. "It'll take a minor miracle to stop me," he says, inclining his head in Romana's direction. "Good afternoon, my Lady President."

*

Leela does not like all these speeches.

It is not that she does not see the beauty in fine words. Leela always listened closely to the stories of her tribe, and learned them as well as she was able, better and more quickly than the other children, knowing the reason for them. There is power in those words, the words of the old tales, handed down from mother to daughter. There is power, too, in words that can rouse a warrior to battle, or cool the heat of young and reckless blood.

And there is more power still in the words they use here on Gallifrey. Their words are not better because they are longer, nor because what they seem and what they say are so far distant. The words here have power because the people here _believe_ in that power, and for no better or worse reason than that. Words are the weapons that they choose and use and trust. They think little of her blade, and yet their skin is no thicker than hers, and as easily cut. But because she thinks little of their words, they find their favorite weapon blunted when it comes up against her.

It is a puzzle to Leela why _they_ should call _her_ ignorant, when there are so many simple things that they will never understand.

Romana is speaking, and Romana's words are good, full of comfort and strength. But Leela does not like this, all the same. She knows that Romana loves crowds. The sight of so many of her people, gathered together to pay her honor, is good for Romana's soul, and she likes to feel that she is speaking to her people. Leela wishes that she could like this, for Romana's sake.

But there is no sight of the crowd for Leela, only a sound, a thousand thousand sounds, too many feet and hands and whispers. Leela cannot find a path through such a maze of noises to see with her ears as she usually does. She does not like to feel helpless, and, what is worse, she hates that she cannot keep Romana safe. She is here as Romana's bodyguard, but she knows that there is very little she can do in this crowd without eyes to guide her. And today especially, she does not like to think of Romana going unprotected. Today, this safe world does not feel so safe after all.

"We gather here today to honor the lives of a group of exceptional young people who were taken from us long before their time," Romana is saying. "Sixteen days ago, as you are all aware, our Prydonian Academy fell victim to an explosion that snatched from us eight students, and all the promise of the lives they would have led. I know that all of Gallifrey joins me in mourning this grievous loss. But I ask that all of Gallifrey join me also in a moment of quiet self-reflection, for the foundations of this tragedy are of our own making, and only with conscious effort on all out parts may we hope to see them unmade.”

It all makes Leela very uneasy. Sixteen days ago, a piece of the past came back to haunt them all, and neither she, nor Romana, nor Narvin, nor Braxiatel has slept a good night since. Sixteen days ago, a bomb exploded in the Academy, and for the four of them, they four who remember the past that once was and now was not, this newest attack has been much worse even than the death of eight children.

"We of Gallifrey have been raised to believe in our own fundamental exceptionality as an elemental fact of the universe, unquestioned and unquestionable. When that belief leads us to an attitude of benevolence, of responsibility, and of sober purpose, it is a credit to our planet and a boon to our fellow species. But when it causes us to assume that we have a monopoly on morality, when it is taken to extremes and tempts us to the belief that the rest of the universe is somehow lesser, weaker, _wrong_ , we bring dishonor on everything Gallifrey stands for. We _must_ remember that the sort of hatred that provoked these attacks can only lead us backwards, away from our best selves.”

Leela remembers. She remembers how quickly the children she had taught broke down into fighting amongst each other, the last time all this happened. She remembers how many of them she has seen dead, once. The children who died then are back now, alive and breathing; Romana brought them all back, as she brought Andred back, and K-9 back, and so many others who fell in the war. And yet now, all these years later, Death has turned his eyes on the Academy again, and for Leela, the ghosts of those who have come back to life hang as heavy as those of the truly dead.

"These deaths were a senseless, wasteful tragedy. It is too late for the innocent children who fell victim to this unprovoked and unconscionable attack. But if there is one thing we can do to begin to atone for the state of complacency that permitted this heinous occurrence, for the ignorant assumptions and societal prejudices that precipitated this terrible crime, it is to reaffirm our commitment to righting those errors in ourselves, and practice unceasing vigilance to ensure that these events are never permitted to repeat themselves."

Leela knows that Romana means those words as a lesson to herself, but they fall just as hard on Leela's ears. They have _both_ seen this happen before. They should both have been able to stop this. They are both to blame. It has been nine years since time turned back on itself, and for nine years, Leela and Romana—and Braxiatel and Narvin, too—have fought to keep the Academy safe from those who would harm the innocent for their own purposes. But after so long, Leela knows that she has let herself grow lazy and contented and stupid, and now eight children are dead who should have had _her_ protection.

Leela has not been idle since. She will not let this be like last time, death upon death, and she knows that the others feel the same. Romana and Braxiatel have given speech after speech, have spoken with everyone who will listen on Gallifrey and off, fighting mighty battles with their words, never stopping for a moment all these two long weeks and more. For Leela and for Andred, who knows of the false past though he did not live it, has been the work of guarding over the students who yet live. And Narvin has spent his time in catching the boy who caused all this, a Time Lord no older than the classmates he killed, and in making him tell all he knows. Narvin thinks that the killer had help from someone else, and until they know for certain, none of them can feel easy.

The crowd has begun to clap, too loud and too many, but there have been many speeches, and Leela has taught herself what to do. She has in her mind the steps between her and Romana, knows when Romana will walk away and which way she will go, knows that Romana will think of this, too, and turn her stride to meet Leela at just the right place, without letting anyone see that is what she does. Leela will not let anyone treat her like a cripple, but Romana knows how to do such small things, without ever saying anything about them, and it makes Leela remember why she would die for this woman who is so unlike herself.

Leela takes Romana's arm, just where she knows it will be, and they walk together into the transport pod that will carry them back to Romana's office—an odd egg-shaped thing that flies itself, a magic no more or less strange than so much of life on this world. When the doors slide shut, and the noise of the crowd disappears as though it had never been, Leela feels that she is finally come alive again.

"What did you think, Leela?" Romana asks, and Leela hears her robes crinkle and shuffle as she sits.

"Was I meant to be listening?" says Leela. "I am sorry, I stopped paying attention once I knew it would not be any different from the last three."

Romana laughs. "Oh, _vastly_ different," she says. "This time, I used 'vile misdeed' instead of 'hideous offense,' and I'm sure I must have placed different emphasis on at _least_ a dozen words."

"Well, then, I am sorry I missed it," Leela smiles. She does not go to sit beside Romana. It suits her better to stand, especially when she is hovering so far above the world.

"I think this will be the last one, for a little while. Or I certainly hope so."

"You need a rest," says Leela.

Romana laughs. "You're one to talk. Your species needs twice as much sleep as mine, and I doubt you've left the Academy for more than six spans at a time since all this happened."

"No," Leela admits. "And I will not, until we are sure that this will not happen again. Has Narvin learned anything more today?"

"I've barely seen him," says Romana. "And his mind was somewhat...elsewhere at the time."

Leela grins. "And where would that be?" she asks, innocently. "Coordinator Narvin never thinks of _anything_ but his work."

"That's almost true, these days," says Romana. "I would be terribly jealous of young Kelnariangortrianon for monopolizing Narvin this way, if the boy weren't completely mad, and destined to live out the rest of his days in Shada."

"You are sure that he is crazy?"

"It certainly seems that way," Romana sighs. "Or maybe we're just inclined to believe that anyone who could kill so senselessly _must_ be insane. He certainly thinks he knows why he chose to plant that bomb."

Leela's mouth tightens. "So many of your people hate us 'aliens,' but it is worse to see it in the young," she says. "If we cannot teach the right way of thinking to those whose minds are still open, what hope is there for us, Romana?"

"This boy's mind wasn't open, not any longer, Leela. Someone else had been pouring poison in his ear somehow, I'm _sure_ of it. Narvin has confirmed that our young assassin had been sending and receiving frequent messages through the Matrix to a contact off-world, but the contents and the recipient have been completely scrubbed—this boy would probably have turned out to be a technical genius, if he hadn't gone so wrong."

"Why would someone off of Gallifrey want this boy to believe that people who are not Time Lords deserve to die?"

"Oh, for any number of reasons, but most probably to damage the intergalactic political situation. You remember how bad it got last time, Leela."

"I could not ever forget."

"Nor me." Leela hears the way Romana fidgets in her seat. "I think I have managed to contain the political situation this time, though it's been a hell of a job. I hate even thinking about it this way, but it was a help that Gallifreyan students died, too. The bomber may have been targeting foreign students, but the other temporal powers are more likely to forgive us, knowing that this is our tragedy as much as theirs. And since the political situation on-planet is so much more stable than it was last time, they shouldn't be able to make a major incident of this crisis...so long as there aren't any more attacks."

"And this is why I will not leave the Academy until Narvin has caught the man who was writing your missing messages."

"And why I'm going to keep on giving speeches," Romana says. "I don't know how much good it does, but I've got to do _something_ to try to change hearts and minds. It'll be a more than uphill battle to pacify a million years of isolationist instincts, I know that, but unless we at least maintain a dialogue...oh, you don't want to hear all this."

"You may tell me anything you like, Romana," Leela smiles. "I do not promise that I will understand all of it, but it helps you, for me to listen, and I am glad to do it."

"Thank you, Leela," says Romana, and Leela knows that she is smiling. "Don't you want to sit? It'll be a few microspans yet before we're back at the Presidential Complex."

"I am better this way. If I let myself rest, I will probably fall asleep."

"I wouldn't blame you a bit."

"But only think how your Time Lords would talk if you came home with your savage asleep on your lap," Leela teases, and Romana laughs.

"You're a married woman, Leela," Romana says. "I don't think they'd assume anything _too_ scandalous."

"It is hard to say, with Time Lords. Your people can be so serious, but you do _love_ to have something to chatter about."

"Oh, how well I know it," Romana says, and then something rings from the other side of the transport pod. There is a click as Romana presses a button, and then there is another voice, a buzzing machine-voice humming through a speaker.

"My Lady President."

"It's only just shy of nine now," says Romana. "You couldn't wait ten microspans to talk to me, Narvin? If you were anyone else, I would say that was sweet of you."

"If you don't think I'm sweet now, you'll absolutely hate me in a moment."

"Let me guess," says Romana. "A minor miracle?"

"In more ways than one," he agrees. "You'll never guess who walked into the lobby just now. I think you'll want to see this one for yourself, Madam President, and I happen to know you've got no more appointments today. Meet me in my office?"

"I'm on my way," she sighs, and turns off the communicator. "Do you want me to drop you at home on the way, Leela? I'll hardly need a bodyguard at CIA headquarters."

"We are near the Academy now, are we not?" asks Leela. "I would rather you leave me there."

"Of course you would," Romana smiles. "Promise me you _will_ sleep sometime tonight, Leela. And Andred, too."

"Only if you will promise me the same."

"Done," agrees Romana. The pod is beginning to slow, descending in a way that makes Leela's stomach churn even though it is smooth and steady. She is a creature of the earth; she does not like to fly, unless it is in a TARDIS, which feels only like stepping into a house, and walking out again. "Thank you for coming along to mind me, Leela. I know you would rather have been here."

"I am no good to you in places like that, Romana. I cannot..."

"I feel more secure with you there," Romana interrupts. "That's your job done, as far as I'm concerned."

The pod slows to a stop, and the doors slide open. "Thank you, Romana," says Leela, smiling, "but I am more use here. I _know_ these halls. Here, I can sense when something is not right, and be near to help if something does go wrong."

"Then go fight your fight," says Romana, catching Leela's hand and squeezing it once before she leaves. "And I'll go see what's so important it's keeping Narvin trapped at the CIA."

 

*

She doesn't believe him, when he first tells her.

"He just _walked in_?"

"I don't know why any more than you do," says Narvin. "I would think it was some sort of far-fetched assassination plot, but whatever else can be said about him, he isn't the sort of man who likes getting his hands dirty."

"I still don't like it."

"No more do I," Narvin admits. "I don't suppose I can convince you to sit quietly behind a vidscreen somewhere safe, and..."

"You're going to be there yourself," she points out.

"Yes."

"And so am I."

He doesn't smile, but his eyes glow at her. "If you insist."

She slips her arm through his, fighting down a smile herself. "Take me to your prisoner, Coordinator Narvin."

"Right away," says Narvin, "my Lady President."

*

"Madam President!" cries the man in the chair, as Romana and Narvin step into his interrogation room, down in the lowest levels of CIA headquarters. "All the suns of the universe have seemed hardly to shine in these long years out of your magnificent presence. You will forgive me not standing, I hope." He tugs at the restraints binding his arms and legs to the chair in the center of the room, and gives a self-mocking shrug.

"Mephistopheles Arkadian," says Romana, in a voice that turns speaking the name into the verbal equivalent of smelling something rotten, "given the fact that you're here under lock and key, I can _almost_ say I'm glad to see you."

"Ah, and Coordinator Narvin! But of course. Whither goes his lady fair, there the gallant knight must follow."

"Of course," says Narvin, rolling his eyes. "Nothing to do with this being my _job_."

"I don't blame you a bit for not wanting to leave her alone with me, Coordinator." Arkadian sighs profoundly, turning back to Romana. "I can't tell you how it broke my heart when I heard the news, Lady P."

"You have a strange idea of news, Arkadian. It's been eight years since the press started taking an interest in my private affairs."

"Oh, how well do I know it! I've hardly slept a wink in all that time for pining. Of course I'd always known there were a pair of beating hearts behind that cool facade, but I _had_ thought you were a Time Lady of taste. Of all the men in the universe..." Arkadian gives Narvin a withering glance. "I mean, _really_. It isn't too late to throw him over, you know. Just slip over here and loosen these straps, oh pearl among Presidents, and I'll take you away with me to see the stars. History suggests that you appreciate that sort of gesture."

"Arkadian," says Romana, with exaggerated sweetness, "I don't begrudge you your outlandish flirtations. I don't even mind that you're a slimy, scheming wretch of a criminal, as we've all got to make our way in this universe _somehow_. Possibly you think you've seen me angry with you in the past, but I assure you, those were nothing more than minor misunderstandings. If you continue to insult Narvin in front of me, however, I'm afraid I shall have to _become_ angry. Do we understand each other?"

Arkadian looks to Narvin. "How truly apt that lionesses should be the fearless hunters while the lions sit at home tamely licking their paws, eh, Coordinator?" he asks. "All right, Madam P, I know better than to thrust my head into the mouth of a lioness with quite so many teeth."

"I really don't think that you do," says Romana, wryly. "What are you doing here Arkadian?"

"Ah, it's quite a funny story, that," says Arkadian, grinning. "I have...shall we say...an acquaintance..."

"A wise choice of word," Narvin mutters. "If you'd said 'friend,' I could never have believed you."

"If not for your lioness, Coordinator...well, you can imagine."

"You have an acquaintance," Romana prompts. "Not usually enough to lead a man voluntarily to subject himself to the tender mercies of the CIA."

"If only you knew the acquaintance in question, I think you might have cause to reconsider that assessment. No matter how low your opinion of me, Madam P—and unjustly, I feel I must point out—even you would declare me a positively respectable man of business if you'd ever met Sabalom Glitz."

"I have met Sabalom Glitz," Narvin puts in, "and while I don't think any comparison whatever could render _you_ respectable, Arkadian, I do take your point. You realize that the idea of the two of you in league is the sort of thing that keeps me up at night."

Arkadian darts a sidelong glance at Romana, and opens his mouth. "Don't even think about it," she preempts.

"I don't mind being tied up and subjected to your strange ideas of Time Lord hospitality, but really, denying a man an opportunity like _that_ is sheer cruelty, Madam President."

"Tough," says Romana, shortly. "Tell me what brought you to Gallifrey, Arkadian, _now_ , or I'll leave you here for a month or two to think it over. I'll try to remember to have someone feed you now and then, but you know I am _terribly_ busy."

"If you insist, my Lady. Well, our Mr. Glitz has recently gone respectable, which I assure you has marked no improvement whatever to his character in general. Did it for a woman, if the rumors are to be believed; very shocking affair, if you ask me. Fortunately, he does still have _some_ self-respect. Had a very nice little going-out-of-business sale to commemorate the occasion."

"You got your hands on something," says Narvin. "Something we here on Gallifrey would rather you didn't have. Information?"

"Yes, and at the same time no." Arkadian smiles in his infuriating way. "You'll understand, lady and gentleman, that I find it deeply disconcerting to be so forthcoming—not at all my style—but you see, you really must believe that I _know_ what I know. We'll never understand each other otherwise."

"And what do think you know, Arkadian?"

"A very great number of things," says Arkadian, his eyes suddenly pinning Romana's, studying her hard, "Madam Imperiatrix."

Romana's jaw tightens. "I've told you not to call me that, Arkadian. _Don't_ push me."

"Ah, but that's just it, my Lady. The last time you advised me against that form of address, it was _before_ you staked your claim to it."

Narvin forces himself not to visibly react. Only four people in the universe ought to know that there is any connection at all between Romana and the title of Imperiatrix. She never did claim that title. It didn't actually happen, not anymore, and at the same time it did, and that's a very dangerous prospect indeed.

Temporal intervention is admittedly Narvin's line of work, but the time Romana used the Key of Rassilon to erase six months of history was different, profoundly different, from anything Narvin had been involved with before. Minor temporal shifts that affect only static intelligences, single-dimensional beings stuck on their narrow paths moving stubbornly from birth to death in one simple, consistent order, those are nothing. But what he and Romana and Leela and Braxiatel did was temporal meddling on the grandest possible scale: not only affecting time-faring races, not only undoing a significant portion of Relative Gallifreyan Time, but affecting such a significant alteration as to mark a switch between completely different dominant realities, jumping an entire time-track. The timeline can cope with a multitude of minor alterations and remain functionally the same entity, gradually molding itself like ivy being gently trained to grow in a certain direction. But what Romana did with the Key was violent and sudden, more like lopping off the tendril of ivy entirely and transplanting it somewhere else.

There's a reason they've kept that alteration secret. The other temporal powers would be violently outraged by such heavy-handed tactics, and there are many on Gallifrey who would seize the opportunity to have a swing at Romana and her Presidency. It was an enormous decision, taken almost unilaterally, and every single sentient being in the universe will feel they ought to have had a say, Narvin doesn't doubt. It's information that _must_ be kept out of the wrong hands—and it seems to have fallen into the wrongest hands Narvin can possibly imagine.

Narvin's first reaction to any failure of Gallifreyan security is the same as that of any CIA Coordinator since time immemorial: 'What does the President think about it?' When Romana is angry, the dullest witness couldn't fail to know it. Her cheeks blaze, her eyes flash, every line of her body screams her displeasure, and, generally speaking, there's a good deal of _literal_ screaming as well. Narvin has lost count of how many times he's seen her that way. She has a quicker temper than anyone else he's ever met, a trait he doesn't so much object to as adore; he's not certain what it says about him, but he never finds her more irresistible than when she's burning bright-hot with self-righteous fury, even (and perhaps especially) when it's directed at him. He expects her to be in a rare state now, but she's standing very still, coiled tight, everything tamped down and repressed. And he knows that she's far more dangerous this way than she is when she lets her anger show.

"You are going to tell me everything you think you know," she says, absolutely calm, in a deadly undertone, "as clearly and completely as possible, and _now_. You are going to tell me how you came by these ideas, and with whom you have shared them. Do you understand me, Mephistopheles Arkadian?"

"Perfectly, Madam President." Arkadian isn't joking now, either. Narvin hasn't ever taken time before to give this man credit for the effectiveness of his mask. When Arkadian isn't playing the charming rogue, it's suddenly much easier to remember that this human has on more than one occasion run circles around the greatest geniuses on Gallifrey. Narvin knows that Arkadian is dangerous, but only rarely does he feel that danger as an instinctive, gut reaction. "I had almost come to the good part of my little story, anyway. You see, Mr. Glitz, _sparkling_ wit though he may be, had no idea what he really had to sell. He thought they were fake Matrix records, and that he was taking me for a tremendous ride in billing them as the real McCoy. What he didn't realize was that I wasn't paying him for his tapes, but for the story of how he'd obtained them. Given that he wasn't clever enough to find a way back into the Matrix himself after his own little sojourn there, he naturally assumed that no one else could use the details of his thrilling tale as an account of how that feat might be managed. He'd have charged me a very great deal more, if he'd realized _that_."

"The Matrix," says Narvin, hoarsely. " _You've_ been inside the Matrix."

"You needn't look quite so pale, Coordinator. Getting in is one thing, getting to the good stuff is another. I haven't had my sticky little fingers all over your precious tech. I don't know how to build a TARDIS, much less a timeonic fusion device. I haven't learned all the secrets of your vaunted Vortex. Not that I wouldn't have liked to, you understand, but having the key to the front door, it turns out, isn't nearly enough to best the internal security the Matrix maintains around anything it considers sensitive. I've never pretended to that level of technical expertise. Still, there are one or two things a man can do in your little virtual universe without running up against brick walls."

"Such as?"

"Oh, I've just been having a few conversations with the shades of your dead. Fascinating conversationalists, ex-Time Lords. While I was in, you see, I thought I'd just drop by to see my dear old friend Torvald. You remember Torvald? Yes, of course you do."

"I can't imagine he was particularly pleased to see _you_ ," says Romana, skeptically.

"You'd be surprised, Madam P. Apparently, the thing about being dead is, you're pleased to see _anyone_. In fact, our Torvald was apparently so starved for company that he'd actually grown quite friendly with the man who killed him, of all Time Lords. A certain former Castellan by the name of Andred."

Narvin hisses in a breath, before he can stop himself. "Top marks, Coordinator," says Arkadian, impressed. "I'd not expected you to catch on even quicker than her Excellency here. Maybe you aren't just a...erm... _pretty_ face."

"Keep talking, Arkadian," snaps Romana.

"Of course, my Lady. Well, naturally I was skeptical when Torvald mentioned Andred. 'He's been popping in from the outside world to visit a man he murdered?' said I. 'A bit morbid, if you ask me.' 'What are you on about, Arkadian, you lovable scamp?' said Torvald. 'Andred is just as dead as I am.' 'I hate to speak ill of the dead,' countered I, 'but you're talking nonsense, fellow. It's a well-known fact on Gallifrey that Andred is alive and well and back in the good graces of that magnificent flower of Gallifreyan womanhood, your noble President.' 'I can prove it,' said Torvald, and lo! Who should appear by his side but Andred himself."

Romana has caught on too, by now. One state of Romana-tension and another may be very much alike to the untrained eye, but Narvin had cause to learn the geometry of the various slopes of her shoulders even when she was nothing more to him than a thoroughly demanding superior. He can tell that she's begun to comprehend the likely trajectory of Arkadian's tale.

"Of course, I was somewhat startled," continues Arkadian. "After expressing my condolences, I asked him how long he had been in this unhappy state, feeling certain that his demise must have been a very recent occurrence for the fact to have escaped my notice. Imagine my shock, then, when he informed me that he had been dead for some eight and half years. Of course, one doesn't like to contradict a man on so personal a detail as the date of his own death, but I ventured gently to suggest that I was fairly sure he had been alive and well long since then. 'Well, yes, of _course_ ,' quoth he, rolling of his eyes. 'You say it as though I were the only one. Half of Gallifrey is alive out there and dead in here.' And therein, it turned out, hung quite a tale.

"I pride myself, Madam P, that I am something of a patient man. I spent the better part of a week in audiences with various Gallifreyan dead—many of whom are still, officially, quite alive and well. They had such engrossing tales to tell me. Revolution, civil war, destruction in the Citadel, devastation at the Academy, Gallifrey's enemies circling like vultures overhead, and then...nothing. Of course, none of your shades had information from a moment later than their own deaths, but those who had died _after_ a certain point told a very different story. Those who had died after a certain point, in fact, remembered no civil war, any more than I did myself. No one could tell me how that war had ended, no one could tell me whether the valiant Romana or the treacherous, scheming Pandora had triumphed. Odder still, those Matrix shades who remembered dying in the war were, I learned, almost universally alive in the real world, and those who actually _had_ died around that time didn't remember any war at all.

"Well, I don't know about you, my Lady President, but I found all of that rather peculiar. Curiosity is, admittedly, one of my many vices, and so I thought I might do a bit of investigation. It had occurred to me, you see, that someone just _might_ have been playing with the timelines, if there were two different versions of history floating around. Of course, I know how you lot frown upon such temporal naughtiness. 'Mephistopheles Arkadian,' I said to myself, 'if you've uncovered some underhanded and dastardly plot, you'll be lauded as a hero, and perhaps that sweet Lady President of the Time Lords might just forgive one or two little peccadilloes of days gone by.'

"The trouble with that theory, however, was that it certainly seemed a Gallifreyan was the most likely culprit. For one thing, the technology to manage a temporal shift quite so _big_ doesn't grow on trees, and any child knows that your planet is worlds ahead of the rest of the universe where temporal tech is concerned. Then, of course, there was the simple fact of that supposed civil war—nothing important enough to write out of history seemed to have been going on anywhere else in the universe during those missing months. My first thought was that some rogue Time Lord or Time Lady must have been to blame, given the temporally irresponsible nature of such a blatant whitewash of the timeline. But just in case, because of course my flimsy human intellect might just possibly have misinterpreted the facts, I thought I might check up on what Gallifrey's lords and masters had been up to around that time. And there _did_ seem to be one or two things that were rather out of the ordinary.

"The most obvious oddity was the case of the blinded savage. I had a little conversation in the Matrix with a former member of your guard, Madam P, a man who claimed to have died in the war-that-wasn't. He told me that the Lady Leela had been blinded by an ill-timed explosion shortly before his own unfortunate demise. On the other hand, the official story of how your bodyguard came by her dark glasses—which she donned just around the moment when what I may call 'the war timeline' apparently began to diverge from the real one—has been the simple catchall verdict of 'accident.' Of course, the populace of Gallifrey, having a very low opinion of the intelligence of humans in general and a still lower one of Leela in particular, were more than willing to shake their heads at such careless folly as only to be expected of a lower creature. As a human myself, however, I didn't find myself inclined to share that bias. Based on our previous meetings, I would have called Bodyguard Leela quite a graceful woman, terribly competent in all things physical. Taken all in all, a war seemed a much more likely setting for such a woman to end up with that kind of wound than the course of daily life around the Citadel. And that she would obtain identical injuries twice, in two different ways, in two different timelines...well, that was unlikelier still.

"So supposing the Lady Leela actually _had_ been wounded in a Gallifreyan civil war—what then? Obviously, she had traveled back in time. More obviously still, she hadn't been the one to affect those changes to the timeline; your savage may be cleverer than she looks, Madam President, but she's certainly not clever enough to rewrite history single-handed. She must have had help. She must have been working with someone else.

"Having the advent of Leela's blindness to work with gave me a very clear idea of _when_ I ought to be paying attention to. And that was, it turned out, a very eventful period among the high-and-mighty of this planet. Chancellor Braxiatel, for example, was elevated to that title within days of Leela's blindness becoming public knowledge. Now, my Matrix contacts had been telling me very interesting things indeed about the dear Chancellor: leaving the planet, suddenly and mysteriously, for—according what seemed to be the best-informed sources—terribly _noble_ reasons. Of course he _might_ simply have been given a new title because he's a dedicated man, but the timing was certainly something to think about. And then," Arkadian looks from Narvin to Romana and back, "there's my favorite little coincidence. I don't suppose you'd care to guess?"

"Please, do inform us," says Romana, would-be sardonically. "Your incredible theories have been _so_ entertaining thus far."

Arkadian raises an eyebrow, and Narvin wonders whether or not going on the offensive was a misstep on Romana's part. This is her show, but if he were in charge, he thinks he'd have avoided confirming or denying anything, even implicitly, until Arkadian's talkative streak had reached its end. Arkadian seems to have much the same idea.

"Incredible, are they? Forgive me, Madam P, but I've seen any number of less credible things in my time. The Lady President and her CIA Coordinator suddenly putting aside their animosities in the name of romance, just for example? Which, incidentally—if your limited statements to the press concerning the commencement of that amorous entanglement are to be believed—occurred _just_ at the moment when time folded back on itself."

"Even _if_ your story is true and there has been some form of temporal interference at play, Arkadian, I fail to see how it could possibly have anything to do with my love life. I suffer from no undue modesty over my abilities in any arena whatever, but I would hardly assert that my kiss is sufficient to make the timelines tremble."

Arkadian grins. "My dear Madam President, I admit I had been inclined to doubt your soundness of mind since I heard about the Coordinator here. It's such a wonderful comfort to know that your wit remains intact. But that's not _precisely_ the conclusion I was hinting at. My sources in the Matrix told me, you see, that the civil war that never happened began in the most thrilling style, with the Coordinator here flinging himself in the path of a bomb to rescue your noble self, and that he proved one of your staunchest allies during that unhappy conflict. Now perhaps I'm simply an old romantic, but it has been my experience that such acts of valor are sometimes just the thing to melt the ice between a man and a woman who formerly may have been at odds. My perceptions may have been limited, but when we all shared that wonderful little adventure with the trains, it didn't seem to me as though the two of you got on very well at all. I'd have laid a pretty penny then against any such tender feelings developing in the normal course of events, but on the battlefield, fighting side by side, with emotions running high..."

"Clearly, you don't know as much about women as you like to claim," says Romana. "I can hardly believe that you've _never_ seen two people bicker as a sign of romantic interest."

"You spend enough of your own time flirting with her Excellency, Arkadian," adds Narvin, eying the human with distaste, and then looking to Romana with a hint of a smile. "Did you suppose I was blind?"

"No, Coordinator," Arkadian says, grinning, "but I didn't think _she_ was either, and I've clearly been proven wrong there, haven't I?"

"Did we or did we not have words about the consequences of provoking my temper, Arkadian?" says Romana. "And don't go giving him openings, Narvin, you only make things worse." She turns back to Arkadian. "I'm afraid I don't think much of your disordered collection of theories," she tells him, coolly, "but I'll have the matter looked into. Some minor glitch in the Matrix, I don't doubt; it analyzes possible futures, and it's possible that, at a certain key moment, it simply got caught up in analysis. No doubt the war you mention seemed important data to it, even though that war never _actually_ occurred, and it's programmed to give preference to climactic events over humdrum ones. If it wouldn't be an absurd anthropomorphization, I'd say the poor thing was probably disappointed that the actual past turned out so much less entertaining than its forecasted possibilities."

"Oh, bravo, Madam P," says Arkadian. "A magnificent performance, truly."

"What I fail to understand," says Romana, "is why you would possibly come all the way to Gallifrey— _not_ a simple feat—and proceed to turn yourself in to the CIA, all in order to present a wildly improbable tale without a shred of proof, and with not a single thing to gain. You're a businessman, Arkadian, or so you've always led us to believe. Don't play me for a fool. Why are you really here?"

"Did I imply I had no positive proof? How terribly clumsy of me. I'm not a young man any longer, alas, Madam P; I do get caught up when there's a good yarn to unfold. And as to what I stood to gain...well, I do so hate to squabble over terms. Name a figure, plunk as many zeros behind it as you dare, and I expect you'll be in the neighborhood."

"You expect Gallifrey to pay you for alleged proof you allegedly have of alleged alterations of the timeline which can be allegedly traced back to Leela, possibly in collusion with Braxiatel, Narvin or myself? I believe you capable of practically anything, Arkadian, but one of the few things I _don't_ expect you to do is waste my time."

"How charming your girlish notions are, Madam President," Arkadian grins. "But as a matter of fact, you've got it all wrong. I don't expect to sell you anything remotely so concrete. I'm not certain you've noticed, but I am prone to yammer on—a terrible failing, I know. I had thought it might be in your best interest to finance some lessons in discretion."

"You want us to buy your _silence_? How very quaint," says Narvin. "Even if we did have something to cover up, that's hardly a policy the CIA would ever endorse. For one thing, we'd have no guarantee whatever that you wouldn't simply take our money and proceed to sell to the entire rest of the universe the very same information we'd paid you not to share." He smiles unpleasantly. "Fortunately, we needn't even consider the technicalities. You'll have a bit of trouble doing anything whatever with this little tale of yours from inside one of our holding cells."

"CIA subtlety at its finest," says Arkadian. "But not very clever of you. You don't think I'd show up here without a plan in place? Just the usual sort of thing; if I don't walk out of here within a certain span of time, a friend of mine will see to it that this little story, and my proof of it, makes its way into the hands of the relevant media outlets. Very embarrassing for Gallifrey, that would be. Maybe even damaging, wouldn't it? I do have a sneaking suspicion that there are other heads of state in this universe who might just be interested in the tale I have to tell. I don't suppose that everyone out there would be quite so dubious when confronted with the notion of Gallifreyan interference. There's quite a popular perception that the Time Lords engage in such dealings on a regular basis, isn't there? Even as a political outsider, it isn't difficult to gather that the other temporal powers wouldn't be best pleased to hear of this little incident."

There is a brief silence, and Arkadian continues, "Then again, perhaps they would. I'd imagine more than one of your fellow time-faring races wouldn't exactly say no to an excuse to think worse of Gallifrey. Tensions have been running a bit high lately, haven't they? Ever since that _tragic_ incident at your Academy."

Romana tenses, and so does Narvin. After nine years, even Narvin had been forced to admit that Romana's great social experiment seemed to be shaping itself into a success, with the proper monitoring and support in place. But this recent bombing has left nothing certain. So far, Romana has been able to contain the incident without major international repercussions, but she has been unable to deny that the crime was apparently racially motivated, and the situation at present is very, very delicate. Narvin has been finding it difficult to set aside memories of the past-that-wasn't, and remind himself that there is no reason why things should spiral similarly out of control this time.

"But then," says Arkadian, like an echo of Narvin's own thoughts, "that's just how the _last_ war started. Isn't it?"

Narvin watches as Romana's eyes widen, minutely, so little only he would ever notice. She looks slowly up at Arkadian. "You had a hand in it," she says, slowly, working it out in her head as she speaks. "The bomb at the Academy. _You_ pushed that poor stupid child into it. You're that mysterious correspondent we've been hunting for."

"I would _never_ have anything to do with that poor mad boy and his tragic delusions, my Lady President," says Arkadian, grinning like a wolf.

"Oh _yes_ you would. _And_ you're not just here so we'll pay you to avoid embarrassment. Are you?"

"Embarrassment isn't the half of it," says Arkadian, eyes gleaming. "You're going to pay me to avoid another war."

Narvin's blood turns cold. He's seen Gallifrey weak before, delivered into its enemies' hands. And this time, there won't be a miracle waiting on the other end.

"What do you have, Arkadian? _Specifically_?"

"Proof," he says. "Solid, irrefutable proof. Proof that time was reversed, proof that your government was involved, and proof, incidentally," Arkadian's mouth hardens, "that the Eye of Harmony is considerably weaker than it used to be. Which leaves _you_ considerably weaker than _you_ used to be, as a planet, as a species, and as a President. Doesn't it, Romanadvoratrelundar?"

"You will _not_ speak to me as though I were your friend, Mephistopheles Arkadian," Romana snaps, eyes like embers. "You _killed_ my students. _My_ people, and allies here under _my_ protection."

"And millions, billions, _trillions_ more will die in the temporal war I could orchestrate," says Arkadian. "Can you afford to take that risk?"

"What kind of proof?" asks Narvin, before Romana can say anything. He's _never_ seen her so furious before. He wouldn't be entirely surprised if he were to find himself peeling her fingers from Arkadian's throat sometime in the near future.

"I may have been slightly exaggerating my own lack of technical expertise, and your Matrix's security capacities," says Arkadian. "I still can't build a TARDIS, but you don't keep your history as well-secured as all _that_. I did talk with your dead, but the really interesting bits seemed far too good to get secondhand. Not when I could just jump in and watch. And borrow a copy to share with one or two friends."

"Even when it comes to its historical records, the Matrix knows that the actions of a President and her advisers are sensitive material."

"Oh, indeed, Madam President. But the everyday activities of every Tom, Dick and Harryderrydorianopoly on Gallifrey, every single Time Lord who lived through that little civil war of yours... I have more than enough to prove that it happened. I also have more than enough to prove that the Eye of Harmony was involved, and that, if nothing else, points the finger straight at your good self, Lady P."

"How you got _any_ information on the Eye..."

"You cannot expect me to give away _all_ my secrets, my Lady. It's simply not my nature."

"I can and I do," says Romana. "But setting that aside for the moment, supposing I believe you. Suppose I accept that it's possible you have intelligence that _appears_ to suggest I was involved in some sort of temporal intervention that resulted in the disappearance from time of a Gallifreyan civil war. This is what you are going to do for me, Arkadian. You are going to tell me the precise location of every single copy of this so-called evidence, and the identities of every single person with whom you have already shared it, with whom you have discussed it, or who might ever even have caught a hint of its existence. _If_ you do this, I will refrain from suggesting vaporization when you are tried as an accomplice to the eight murders at the Academy, however much I would like to see you suffer. If you do this quickly, courteously and _very_ apologetically, I may even see to it that the cell in which you live out the rest of your days is equipped with a blanket and a pillow."

"What a terribly generous offer, Madam P," says Arkadian. "I'm afraid I do still prefer my counterbid, however. Don't want to see your dirty little secret in the hands of the universe at large? Put your money where your mouth is. How much is peace worth to you?"

"The idea that you could singlehandedly provoke a war is amusing, Arkadian, but hardly convincing, even if everything else you've said is true."

"You don't sound very sure, Madam President." Arkadian sits up just a hint straighter. "You've seen with your own eyes precisely how delicate the balance is. Every other temporal power, every aspiring temporal power, every race with any pretensions at all wants to see your planet fall, and the one and only thing that unites them is their hatred of your species and the power you lord over them. Add to that the facts that it's a very, very long time since your species outgrew the warrior stage, that your greatest technology has been lost nearly that long, and that you've spent the intervening generations intentionally losing any creativity, any instinct towards innovation. I don't have to convince you that you're vulnerable. You've _seen_ it. You've seen your planet overrun. You've seen precisely how easily it can be done." Arkadian smiles, small and satisfied. "And so have I. What has happened once can be made to happen again, Madam P."

"Arkadian," says Romana, "you have fundamentally misjudged my character if you think there is _any_ chance you will ever see the sun again. The rest of it I could perhaps forgive, but you killed _children_ , and they were _mine_. You are not going to get out of this cell, much less saunter out with your pockets full of cash. I don't care what plans you have at work out in the wider universe, what threats you have to offer, I don't care _what_ you think you can do. Tear down the pillars of the universe around the both of us, but so long as I have any say in it, you are going to live and die in CIA custody. _Nobody_ gets to kill _my_ people and go free."

"I'm afraid you'll have a difficult time proving I had anything to do with that."

"I don't need to prove it to anyone else. Your other, older crimes are more than sufficient to keep you imprisoned here. And I'm just as certain myself as I'll ever need to be."

"No chance whatever of convincing you to see reason?"

"I never permit myself to see anything else."

"And what about you, Coordinator?" Arkadian asks, turning his gaze on Narvin. "It's a tradition in your Agency to do precisely the opposite of whatever your President wants, isn't it? Wouldn't do to let down the old home side. Go on, then. Make me an offer."

"The thing about that tradition, Arkadian, is that it only works out if the President is kept in the dark. As opposed to, say, standing right next to me at the time." Narvin smirks. "Not to mention that at the present moment, the working relationship between the Lady President and the Coordinator of the CIA is distinctly _un_ -traditional, in more than one sense."

"And that must be quite the challenge at times," says Arkadian. "Man to man, Narvin, she doesn't strike me as the kind of woman to give up the reins at home any more than in the office, hmmm? It must be frustrating, never once being the one in charge. You must simply _yearn_ for a bit of a rebellion every now and then."

"Oh, _constantly_ ," Narvin deadpans. "I had considered killing her in her sleep just to feel alive again, but letting you go free would be _much_ more satisfying."

"Ah. I'll take that as a no, then."

"Come clean, Arkadian," says Narvin, in the voice he saves for moments when he is every inch the Coordinator of the CIA, and reveling in every nanospan. "Tell me where your stolen Matrix files are. Make it easy on yourself." He smiles grimly. "I _will_ find out, sooner or later, and your life will be so much easier if it turns out to be sooner."

Arkadian yawns. "Your threats are so much less interesting than the Madam President's, Coordinator. _No_ imagination. You'll have to pardon me, but I simply cannot endure to sit around and be subjected to such clichéd bluster. I'm afraid we'll have to save the rest for some other time."

The way Arkadian is sucking in his cheeks is strange, a specific sort of strange that rings bells somewhere in the back of Narvin's mind, old training grown rusty over the centuries. It takes Narvin a moment to pinpoint what he thinks is going on, and then there's another moment of incredulity. Arkadian would _never_ resort to suicide, no matter how dire his situation seemed to be; he thinks far too well of himself for that. He can't _possibly_ be going for a capsule of poison.

That moment of unbelief costs Narvin dear. He doesn't leap for Arkadian immediately, and by the time he does move, Arkadian already has a small gold band clutched between his front teeth. With a wink in Romana's direction, Arkadian sticks the tip of his tongue through the ring in his teeth, and vanishes into thin air.

The only sound in the interrogation room is a gentle thump, as the straps that were once around Arkadian flop forlornly to lie limp on his now-empty chair.

*

"This is _completely_ unacceptable, Narvin, and you know that! How did he even get his hands on a Time Ring? Isn't your Agency in charge of seeing to it those are kept under very strict control? And why wasn't he searched properly?" Romana is pacing up and down in the transport pod carrying them back to her office, Narvin standing tense by the door.

"The operatives who took him in..."

"Have made us look like complete bumbling idiots!" she fumes.

"In front of whom, precisely? Arkadian already thought we were complete bumbling idiots, Madam President."

"And I don't suppose he's going to be revising his opinion based on this little debacle!"

"Good!" Narvin snaps. "Being underestimated by one's enemies is a very useful thing."

"Oh, I know it is. If he _were_ underestimating us I'd be pleased, but he seems to have got us _right_ on the nose, wouldn't you say? He was banking on your Agency being precisely as credulous as in fact they proved to be. And as a result..." she runs a hand through her hair. "This isn't good, Narvin. If he does have proof of Gallifreyan involvement in the unmaking of the war..."

"Then we'll deal with it."

"Very easy for you to say, but I'm the one who'll have a universe of ruffled feathers to deal with. The _Monans_ are going to..."

"That's not what I meant," Narvin interrupts. "I won't let this get as far as the other temporal powers."

"You've had your operatives out hunting Mephistopheles Arkadian for a decade now with no result, not until he _chose_ to show up on your doorstep. You're not going to find him again in the next few days, even if you can trace the temporal signature of that time ring he used."

"But we know where he's likely to go. If we keep a watch on the capitals of the other temporal powers, and of all major news organizations..."

"For all we know, he's jumped back in time and told them already! And if not, he'll only send someone else. He admitted he had an accomplice."

"He was lying about that. And even if it is true, even if he is working with a partner, he'd never trust someone else to negotiate with major leaders. Not with the kind of money that will be at stake."

"I'm not sure he'll even bother trying to sell. I accused him once of warmongering for the sake of personal profit. I still think he's capable of it. He's the kind of man who _thrives_ on chaos. Oh, he'll sell his information if he thinks he can— _and_ his method of accessing the Matrix, and I want that found and dealt with immediately—but if that proves too difficult, I wouldn't be surprised if he gave up on making his profit directly, and just found a way of smuggling his story to the press. Dammit!" She slams her open palm against the wall, and drags her other hand through her hair, grimacing. "The entire universe could know everything within spans, or he could hold on to this for weeks, months, _years_ , and we'll have no way of knowing..."

"Call the other temporal powers," Narvin suggests. "Tell them everything. Come clean."

"I will if I think it's the only way to avert a crisis," she sighs, "but it might not even work, and it'd lose me my Presidency, Narvin. If I'd had the approval of the High Council to use the Eye, _maybe_ the rest of Gallifrey could forgive it, but I doubt even that would have helped much. They'll say I plunged this world into catastrophe, and then plundered our greatest resource to get us out of it—and they'd be right."

"Whereas if the story comes out some other way," he says, quietly, "the intergalactic situation will be so perilous that the rest of Gallifrey will have no choice but to rally behind you."

"You cannot possibly think that I would risk a _war_..."

"No, of course not," he says, though privately remembering the fact that Romana once fought a war for the sake of her office, "but if there's going to be one, you wouldn't risk letting someone else be the one to lead it."

"I won't risk letting someone else lead us _into_ a war. I'm not going to let it happen, Narvin, I _won't_. I don't care what it takes, I _will_ stop this. It may be an incident, but it won't become a war. I won't see my planet torn apart. Not again."

"I hope so, but we still need to start preparing. I can see to it, quietly, that research into the most promising new weapons and defense projects are stepped-up, and I'll go through my files on potential informants among the major temporal powers, see if I can't..."

"Absolutely not," says Romana, in a voice that brooks no disagreement. "I won't have your spooks making the situation worse. We are _not_ going to waste our time preparing for a war, we'll need every nanospan fighting to keep the peace. You will not do anything that could be interpreted as battle preparations by _anyone_ , do you understand me?"

"Romana, we need a plan-B! If we'd had _any_ fall-back options last time, the situation might not have ended up so..."

"This isn't last time!" she snaps. "Arkadian is playing on our memories, Narvin, don't you see that? He's banking on us reacting as though this were the past repeating itself, but it _isn't_. This is now, and that isn't going to happen again."

"But if it does..."

" _No_. You are going to behave as though the Phaidon, the Nekkistani and the Monans were watching at every single moment, Coordinator, because some of the time they will be. We are _not_ going to give them grounds for war!"

"You expect me to do nothing?"

"I expect you to put your best men on finding Mephistopheles Arkadian—to go on the hunt _yourself_ , if you think it'll do any good. I expect you to lock down the Matrix so tightly that no one will _ever_ get in again without the proper authority. I expect you to make sure every defense system on Gallifrey and the colonies is in perfect working order, but not to go building any new ones; that would send the wrong message. And I expect you to behave like a diplomat, for once. You will not antagonize the other temporal powers in any way. The men and women of your agency will not antagonize the other temporal powers in any way. You will recognize that being a part of the intergalactic community means swallowing your pride and making sacrifices, and you will do so with, if not a smile, not a sneer, either." She stops and considers for a moment. "That goes doubly because of us, Narvin. I don't _only_ trust you as my Coordinator. Nobody in the universe is going to believe that there's one single thing your operatives get up to in this universe that I don't know about. Not when they all know we're sleeping together."

Narvin laughs, one quick burst. "Oh, that's just perfect," he says, wryly. "I haven't had ten waking microspans alone with you for weeks, and yet the comforts of a good bit of espionage are off-limits because I spend too much of my time in pillow talk with the Lady President."

For the first time since Arkadian disappeared, Romana's eyebrows unfurrow, and she bites her lip over a smile. Crossing the transport pod, she slides into Narvin's arms, tucking her head beneath his chin. "My poor Coordinator," she says, laughingly, the words muffled against his chest. "How you do suffer in my service."

"It's intolerable," he agrees, kissing the crown of her head and pulling her in closer. "I may have to complain to the higher-ups."

"I'm the highest-up there is, and you're stuck with me," she grins, turning her face up to his.

"How very unfortunate," he murmurs.

Their lips have barely touched when the slightest of bumps indicates that their pod has landed. Romana makes a disapproving little noise against his mouth before pulling away.

"I've got to see whether there are messages from the other temporal powers. And even if not, I've got preemptive smoothing-over to do. And I need to bring Brax in on this, and probably Leela and Andred as well, and..."

"Go," he says. "I've got a criminal genius to catch. I doubt I'll manage even a few spans of sleep tonight—likely as not, I'll end up getting about twenty microspans on a cot at headquarters—but if I can steal at least a little time, I'll try to drag myself back this way. It may not be much, but we might both manage to collapse of exhaustion in the very same bed for a span or so."

"And if we're very lucky, possibly even at the same time," she says, with a soundless, incredulous laugh. "Rassilon, the lives we lead."

"Neither of us would ever do anything else."

"No," she agrees, smiling. "Do you think you could possibly sort of flop your arm across me mid-collapse? I think I'd probably like that, in a semi-conscious sort of way."

He laughs. "No promises, but I'll see what I can do."

"Right." She kisses him once more, quickly, and then she's pressing the controls for the door. "Keep me updated on developments."

"I will, Madam President."

"Once more into the breach," she sighs, and he watches as she squares her shoulders, and marches back toward the battlefield.


	2. Pax Romana

"High Monan, if you would only _listen_..."

"One has listened to Gallifreyan arrogance for centuries, Madam President! One wonders, on the contrary, whether Gallifrey will ever be capable of listening to the rest of the universe."

"I am happy to hear any and all views that you would care to present, High Monan. I see many reasons why the trade agreement in question is mutually advantageous as it stands, but I freely admit that there may be flaws that require re-negotiation, which may have escaped my notice. To which specific clauses do you and your government object?"

"Is One to be _allowed_ to share? What magnificent condescension. One feels so _honored_."

"Please, High Monan, I cannot even begin to address your concerns unless I know what they are! So far as I understood it, the importation of jethrik to Gallifrey from your colonies on the fourth moon of Salostophus has been a mutually profitable venture for decades, one which I for one have no desire to see discontinued. If it is a matter of an adjustment in terms..."

"It is a matter, Madam President, of Monan security. One doubts whether so powerful a commodity as jethrik is safe in the hands of a race such as the Time Lords."

Romana closes her eyes, draws in a deep breath, and forces herself to be calm. "In all the years that this agreement has been active, High Monan, we on Gallifrey have _never_ used our supplies of jethrik to build weapons, nor even..."

"But One has only the word of Gallifrey for that," sneers the High Monan. "And Gallifrey does not always deign to practice what it preaches—or to share its secrets with the rest of the universe."

"High Monan," says Romana, very slowly, "is it your intention to terminate the trade agreement in question, or do you believe that re-negotiation is possible?"

"One does not see any reason why this agreement should be permitted to continue, particularly when..."

"I see," says Romana. "Thank you for your time, High Monan. I won't trouble you any further. I'm sure we'll speak again soon. A good day to you."

The moment she's switched off the viewscreen to the Monan Host, Romana lets herself fall forward on her desk, her forehead connecting with the wood with a nasty _plunk_.

"Are you fully functional, mistress?" asks K-9, wheeling over from the other side of the room.

"No I am not, K-9. I have a _beastly_ headache—and not from the desk, either. Rassilon, I hate diplomacy, especially when I'm the only one playing at it."

"Recommend aspirin, mistress," K-9 suggests.

"K-9, are you trying to poison me?"

"Mistress?" asks K-9, in his nearest approximation to alarm.

"Sometimes I forget that you were programmed by a human," she says. "K-9, aspirin has a highly negative effect on Time Lord biochemistry."

"Apologies, mistress. Other possible remedies include dark, quiet, and massage of head beneath temporal and sphenoid bones."

"If I had time to sit quietly in the dark I don't suppose I'd have any headaches to worry about, but I may be able to spare the three nanospans to rub my own temples," she sighs.

"Would you rather I did it for you?"

"Narvin," she says, looking up in surprise. "I didn't hear you come in."

"I slipped in while you were busy groveling," he says, wandering in her direction from where he's been skulking against the wall.

"Before you say anything..."

"The President of the Time Lords allowing lesser races to speak to her as though she were pondscum..."

" _Please_ don't let's fight about this again, Narvin," she sighs. "Did you or did you not hear the part about the headache?"

"I know you're not feeling well if you don't even want to _fight_ ," he teases. He's just behind her chair now, and wraps his hands around her shoulders, kneading her tense muscles in a way that makes her breath hiss out from between her teeth with relief. "I have more personal objections too, you know," he says, leaning in to kiss her neck, just below her ear.

She smiles. "Masculine pride, Narvin? Nobody talks to your woman that way?"

"Something like that," he says, his lips grinning against her neck as his hands keep working on her shoulders.

"Your woman has a war to stop, by any means necessary. And so does your Lady President."

"It would be so easy for me to have the High Monan assassinated," he murmurs, in a tone that any other man would use for the whispering of sweet nothings.

"Offering to kill things as a demonstration of devotion. No wonder you and Leela get along so well these days."

"Perhaps I've figured out that her particularly physical way of approaching the world actually does have certain merits," he says, slipping his fingertips just beneath the collar of Romana's robes. He scrapes his teeth along the crook of her neck, and she lets out a shaky breath. "Come to bed, Romana," he whispers in her ear. "It's past midnight already."

"I can't," she says, regretfully. "I have a call with the Phaidon scheduled in a little over a span."

"Postpone it. The Phaidon are the only race who have actually been understanding about this whole thing. They'll forgive you."

It's been a month since Arkadian escaped from CIA custody. The story of the Gallifreyan civil war that disappeared from time hasn't actually become public knowledge, not yet. But it becomes more obvious each day that every Head of State of every temporal power knows. Romana gives Arkadian furious, deeply begrudged credit for the skill with which he's assessed the situation. If the story were actually out in the open, she would at least know what to do, be able to accurately assess the damage to Gallifrey's standing and reputation and go about repairing it, be able to _respond_ to the resultant accusations of irresponsibility and heavy-handedness and unilateral temporal meddling. But it's impossible to answer accusations never explicitly stated, or to apologize for an action that is technically still secret, much less try to atone for it.

At the same time, she can't simply make the thing public herself. Accusations of Gallifreyan arrogance and implications that her people see the timelines as their personal property to be altered at will are what she needs most of all to avoid. Those are the charges that will stick, the ones that could lead them into all-out war on the grounds that Romana has abused her stewardship over timespace solely for Gallifrey's benefit. It doesn't help that she's championed a progressive, inclusive agenda; that only means that she can be drawn as a hypocrite or even a liar for licencing such a dramatic temporal intervention without the support and approval of the other temporal powers. If she goes to the press herself, tries to control the story, she'll appear to be minimizing the importance of her own actions, or even boasting about them, flaunting her power, and that is what she must under all circumstances avoid.

If the accusations come from somewhere else, however, Romana will be able to respond to them properly. If she makes a public statement to the effect that she did indeed turn back time, no one will hear a word she says beyond that simple fact. But if someone else is responsible for the initial revelation and she can play the victim of another party's accusations, the rest of the universe may listen when she says that she only did what was absolutely necessary to save her species from imminent extinction. They may even pay attention long enough for her to point out that the threat she was fighting, the Free Time virus, was developed and disseminated by a foreign national, a Yevnon guest on Gallifrey, and that she displayed incredible self-restraint in not treating the virus as an unprovoked attack by that Princessipality.

There is something terribly disconcerting about feeling that 'on the defensive' is the proper place to be. It's very, very far from Romana's area of comfort, and she's always been taught that one doesn't win a battle without taking the attack. But Romana doesn't want a battle. That's the whole _point_. She's trying to _avoid_ a war, and if that means she has to spend the next decade scraping and groveling to every foreign leader in the universe while they drop heavy-handed hints and insult her to her face, it's no higher a price than she's willing to pay for peace.

"I can't, Narvin," she repeats, willing him to understand. "What few allies we do have, we need to keep, now more than ever. I can't risk offending the Warpsmiths."

He spins her in her chair so she's facing him, and leans in to kiss her lips. "Then slip away with me for the span you do have," he suggests. "K-9 neglected to mention that headaches are caused by vasoconstriction, and that another cure is to amplify the blood-flow. Let me see if I can't find some way of increasing your heartrates."

"I need that span," she says. "I've got memos to read, bills to write, reports to review..."

"They can wait for tomorrow."

"I won't have any time for them tomorrow."

"Do you think it's easy for _me_ stealing this time, Romana?" he asks, his voice straining with suppressed frustration. "I know how..."

"I don't even have time to have this argument with you, Narvin," she says, wearily.

"This isn't just about me, or about us. When was the last time you had even a few microspans for yourself? When was the last time you slept through the night? Forget about anything else—just come next door and nap for a span. I'll see to it you're back here by..."

"I _haven't got time_ , how many times do I need to tell you, Narvin?" she snaps, turning away from him, back to her desk. "Leave me be, for Rassilon's sake."

He doesn't move for a long moment. "My Lady President," he says, in the poisonous way only he has ever managed to speak that title, the one she's grown unaccustomed to hearing him use in these past nine years. She hears his robes rustle as he's walking away.

"Narvin," she says, in a tone that means 'wait,' and then she's up from her desk, and darting after him. To his credit, he does stop, and when she catches him and takes his face in her hands, he returns her kiss wholeheartedly.

"I wish I could," she says, once their lips part. "Please believe that."

His expression softens, and he kisses her again, brief but lingering. "I know you do," he grants. He gives a tired half-smile. "Go rule over your domain, my Imperiatrix."

"I've never much liked that title, Narvin."

"You've always had absolute power where I was concerned."

She smiles. "Then I order you to go get some rest. At least one of us should."

" _Both_ of us should."

"Maybe so," she agrees, "but that simply isn't going to happen."

"Sleep when you can," he advises.

"You don't have to tell me twice, I promise you."

He gives her a nod and a soft, "Romana," and trails his fingers along the back of her hand as he's pulling away. Blinking away the heaviness of her eyelids, she permits herself one small sigh, and then it's back to her desk, and the endless work of the peacekeeping President.

*

"I am worried about her."

Leela is in her rooms in the Citadel, as she is so often, now. She is sick of these walls, she is sick of this city, and she is sick most of all of doing nothing.

"You're always worried about her," says Andred, laying his hand on Leela's shoulder, cool on her skin. "She'll be all right."

"She will not," says Leela. "You look to her face, as though it will tell you anything. She does not ever let anything show on her face. Do you not _listen_ to her, Andred?" Romana does not leave her office for days, sometimes, now. Leela does not meet her very often. And every time she does, Leela can hear the difference from the time before. Romana's spirit grows less and less healthy every day. "She is angry, and she does nothing with that anger, and so it turns on her instead. We are alike in that, she and I. I do not understand why she will not stand and _fight_!"

"Leela," says Andred, "do you understand what a temporal war would _mean_? There hasn't been a time war since the days of Rassilon, and it wouldn't be the kind of war you know—or if it was, the fight would be to keep it that way."

"Wars are wars, even on Gallifrey. I have lived that for myself."

"From what you've told me, the war you fought on Gallifrey only stayed like that because of Romana," says Andred. "The first thing she did was ground all the TARDISes, isn't that right?"

"Yes, that is so."

"If she hadn't, that war would have become a conflict of infinite temporal regression." She makes a face, and Andred says, "Everything that was done would have been undone again. Why would any good general accept a defeat, if he could go back in time and fight the battle all over again? It would just have gone on like that forever, each side rewriting history for its own ends, over and over. And that's what this war will be. I understand why the Lady President is fighting so hard against it, Leela. She hasn't got any choice."

Leela frowns. "Then why does she not do this before there is a war?" she asks. "Could she not go back and change things so that the Sun-ari and the fat-necked ones and the blue men are our friends again?"

"It would be extremely risky, and extremely irresponsible. If agents of Gallifrey were caught changing the past for purely political reasons, there'd be a war for sure, and the timelines can only take so much of that treatment as it is. Going back in a TARDIS and meddling with things, that's dangerous, Leela. Every intervention weakens the web of time more. The reason the Madam President used the Key of Rassilon to erase your civil war, instead of just sending herself back in time, is that such an enormous change could have shattered the entire timeline. It required a power output as enormous as that of the Eye to stabilize that piece of temporal alteration."

"And this is why these other planets are angry?" Leela says. "Because what Romana did was not safe?"

"No," he says. "They're angry because it was something that we could do that they wouldn't have had the power to manage, and they're angry because we did it without their permission."

"Those are stupid reasons," says Leela. "Is their pride worth so much to them that they would risk everything?"

"We have to hope not."

"And so I will be told to sit here doing _nothing_ , and Romana's pride will go on eating her, while she is kicked and clawed by these foolish people who are not worth the dust under her foot."

"That's some very impressive praise, especially coming from you. Should I be jealous?" asks Andred, sitting down beside her. She knows from his voice that he is only teasing.

"What would you do if you were jealous?"

"I would consider it my personal responsibility to remind you why you married me," he says, and puts his hand on her leg.

"Then I think you should be very jealous. Where do you keep this jealousy? Will it take you long to find?"

He laughs. "You don't _have_ to do nothing, you know," he says. "The CIA is still out hunting Arkadian. You could help us in the hunt."

"Your idea of a hunt is not mine. I need to _scent_ my prey. Arkadian is gone two months since. It is your machines that will find him now. My instincts will do you no good."

"Your instincts are usually more use than the CIA's machines, and not always when anyone is expecting it. And even if not, it'll be better for you than having nothing to fill your time."

"Narvin will not object?"

"You know Narvin. He'll complain, but he'll be glad you're there. I thought the two of you got along better these days, anyway."

"He is not a coward, and he is good to my Romana. He would say the same of me, I think. But that does not mean he wants me 'interfering in CIA business.'" She speaks the last words in Narvin's voice, and Andred laughs.

"Well, if he gives you any trouble, I'm sure 'your Romana' can make him behave. One way or another."

"All right, then," Leela decides. "I will come with you on your hunt."

"But not tonight," says Andred, and she knows that he is smiling at her in the way she loves. "The hunt can wait for morning."

*

This was never what he chose her for.

Sometimes, Brax's nostalgia gets the better of him. Occasionally, he tries to convince himself that Romanadvoratrelundar was happy when he met her. It's a lie, of course, but Brax lies to himself _exceptionally_ well. It's the only way to tell the truth to anyone else.

No, Romana wasn't happy as a girl. She took everything seriously, as she always has and always will. Most people would be inclined to say "too seriously," but Braxiatel isn't prone to exaggeration. Romana takes everything seriously, but that's what makes her a leader. She's a perfectionist in every conceivable way, and yet capable at times of living up to her own absurdly high standards, and that is why he selected her, out of all of his students. But this isn't _what_ he selected her _for_.

It was naïve of him, perhaps. Braxiatel isn't immune to naïvety, whatever the rest of the universe may think, and was still less so when he met Romanadvoratrelundar, nearly five centuries ago. The timing had been the kind of coincidence that comes of seeing only at those times when one is prepared to open one's eyes, one of those apparently coincidental opportunities that arrives just at the right moment because only at the right moment does anyone search for opportunity.

Braxiatel had spent a millennium carefully building himself up from nothing, quietly _willing_ the planet to forget the scandal of his own birth. Gallifrey doesn't forgive difference, and certainly wasn't willing to overlook the fact that Brax hadn't _chosen_ to be born of the only union between a Time Lord and a human that even the oldest residents of the planet could remember. They couldn't have forgotten even if they'd tried, not when he was the boy saddled with the Earth name. 'Irving' was insult enough for his classmates, when he arrived; it became 'Irving the Icicle' only once he proved that not only was he willing to work harder than any of them to be the best, but that he was in fact very likely to succeed. When he'd graduated and claimed his name, he might have thrown off the past and been rid of that old stigma. But in a fit of stupid, childish pride—'half-human and _still_ better than all of you'—he had kept the name his mother gave him, adding 'Braxiatel' only as an afterthought.

That bit of braggadocio has cost him dearly, in the years since. The bureaucrats of their planet couldn't deny him a place among their number, not when he had graduated with the best marks of any student in the past three decades and more. But no matter how scrupulously polite he might be, no matter how flawlessly he handled any and every job, he had found himself thwarted and ignored and passed over at every turn by the ancient bastions of society who looked down their noses at the 'half-breed.' His competence and pride had been a threat to their entire world-view, and they'd had more than enough power to keep him at the bottom of the political ladder for far longer than his skill merited. They hadn't ever broken him, not in centuries of trying, but they'd taught him the value of subtlety—how to hide his thoughts, how to be silent, how to wait. They'd taught him that no amount of fire can burn stone, but that water, a tiny, slow, inexorable drip, can erode it away.

He had finally been winning. He'd just begun to gain ground, a little traction in the uphill battle for power and prestige. No one had called him anything but 'Braxiatel' in a very, very long time.

And then the Sontarans had invaded. A certain Time Lord had breezed onto Gallifrey, gusted through a whirlwind Presidency, and floated away again without a care in the universe. And the Doctor had carried a savage in skins with him, and left her behind to marry a Time Lord, and suddenly everyone on Gallifrey was talking about old scandals and new scandals. In the absence of the man himself, it had been inevitable that everyone would suddenly remember the Doctor's brother, the other Time Lord with human in his blood.

Suddenly, the walls Brax had spent centuries systematically dismantling towered higher than ever. He was forced out of the modest civil service post where he'd been quietly dreaming his patient dreams of power. Only a very old Academy precedent, one specifying that the best student in any class was automatically entitled to a tutorship whenever he wanted it, left Brax with any work at all.

He'd been a bitter old man in a young man's body, the ultimate Time Lord—the species gifted with eternal youth yet never, ever young—and the irony of that had hardly escaped him, when he'd been exorcised from society for being not Time Lord _enough_. But he refused to lie down and die. He wouldn't ever, ever let those pompous old fools break his spirit. If they wouldn't allow him to advance through the ranks like any other Time Lord, he'd find himself a rising star, and hitch his wagon to it. That might not take him all the way to the top, but it would certainly be better than languishing at the Academy for the rest of his natural lives.

Romanadvoratrelundar, he knows, wasn't the candidate most men in his position would have chosen. Most men in his position wouldn't ever have got out of it, though, and Braxiatel had. That admittedly had been due in large part to Borusa—not many months after Brax returned to the Academy, the Chancellor had sought him out from pure curiosity about the Doctor's brother, and had been impressed enough to gift Brax with his first ambassadorship on the spot. But that wouldn't ever have made Braxiatel a Chancellor himself. _That_ took seeing Romana for the unpolished jewel she was as a girl, and vowing to himself he'd be a kingmaker if he couldn't be a king.

He hadn't known Romana many years before he set his plan in motion, but he'd known other things. He'd known secret things, dangerous things, the sorts of things only a young man with too much free time and too many brains and government access to help him along could ever find out. He'd known what lurked in the catacombs. He'd known what twined through the genetics of the Dvora family tree. He'd known what to say to nudge a curious, impulsive girl into an exploratory expedition to the Lower City, and what to do to rescue her from the consequences. He'd known how to get her _permission_ to implant a psychic tie binding her to him, to call her back to him if ever the Pandora creature began to awake. And if he'd woven in a thread of trust, the merest suggestion that she really _ought_ to find his advice comforting and his presence desirable, he'd never intended to use it to hurt her. On the contrary: all he'd ever wanted to do for the Lady Romanadvoratrelundar was present her with everything he'd always wanted, and could never have. He may have the wrong blood, but _she_ has the Imperiatrix in her veins. All he ever did was help her understand that.

He hasn't regretted it. His conscience hasn't pricked him. It hasn't ever had cause to. She's grown into her power just as he knew she would, and she's _magnificent_. The greatest art in the universe resides in his collection (human creativity and Time Lord longevity, assembled with the utmost of care and skill—it is _his_ collection all the way through), but his masterpiece sits in the President's chair, the Coronet of Rassilon on her brow.

Until recently, he had even thought that she was happy, more or less.

She isn't happy now. He may have become water, slowly and steadily doing his work, but she is and has only and ever been fire, and the higher grow the walls around her, the stony disapproval of the other temporal powers that she can never burn away, the more they choke off her air. She's built to fight, is his Romanadvoratrelundar (he may use the contraction, but he's never stopped thinking of her that way), and the ceaseless, fruitless, increasingly losing battle to keep the peace wears her down as no amount of real warring could. He looks at her now, standing across a room full of chattering diplomats at the tenth formal reception in two weeks, trying her damnedest to be polite to a cabinet secretary from Yevnon who looks ready to eat her alive, and wonders how he could ever have permitted it to get this bad. But then, even he can't do _everything_.

Tonight's event is being held in a space station floating above Gallifrey, just outside the transduction barriers. It's an immense oval room, glass on all sides, and Brax can't help but think of all these varied representatives as being kept like specimens in an enormous bell jar. Seeing to it that something like a hundred diplomats from a dozen of the foremost temporal powers all play nicely together is difficult at the best of times, and these are far from the best of times. Brax understands why Romana has been organizing these frequent shindigs to reach out to their fellow nations and worlds, but he's not certain they're the best of all possible strategies. They offer far too many opportunities, for example, for any foreign representative who's looking for a bit of entertainment to take a swing at the President of Gallifrey.

Brax straightens his tie, and turns his steps towards Romana, where she stands in the center of the room. There are plenty of things he can't save her from, in this job, but this needn't be one of them.

"You must understand, Secretary Merent, that it would be absolutely impossible for me to convince my own High Council to authorize the release of the information you are looking for," Romana says, as Brax slips quietly into the orbit of the conversation, "but..."

" _You_ must understand, Madam President, that Her Majesty's government finds it worrying to do business with a leader who admits that she cannot keep control of her own people."

"If my Lady President were willing to press the point, Secretary Merent, the Council might perhaps be brought around, but our government finds it difficult to see the merit in dwelling on the past to the exclusion of the future," says Brax, smoothly. "While the records of _every_ Gallifreyan temporal intervention since the Age of Rassilon would no doubt be a document of considerable historical interest, its merits in a modern political context would certainly not be worth the trouble of convincing the more conservative elements of our own society to make those records available. Surely there are more fruitful ventures to which we might all devote our valuable time? I understand, for example, that your Princessipality is interested in playing a greater role in ensuring Vortex security. We would be ready and willing to facilitate that arrangement."

Secretary Merent gives Braxiatel a scornful glance. "And of course that offer would come from a lesser member of the government," sniffs Merent, "so that her Excellency the President of Gallifrey is free to deny having ever promised any such thing, just as soon as it suits her. I did not come to this planet to be patronized by flunkies and functionaries, Madam President." The Secretary turns and flounces away, swishing her tail dramatically behind her.

Romana looks up at Brax. For the merest moment, her eyes hold an expression which he can only call despair, and then she has herself back under control, studiously neutral.

"Thank you for trying, Brax," she says. "I wasn't doing any better myself, and you just spared me ten more microspans of that treatment."

"Has there been any change of feeling among the Yevnon recently, Madam President?"

"Only in the wrong direction," she sighs. "They're more hostile every day."

"And any of the others?"

"The Monans run hot and cold. One day they're threatening to cut all diplomatic ties, the next day they're sickeningly cordial. If it's meant as a psychological tactic, it's working." The ambassador from Phaidon wanders past, sparing a quick, friendly greeting for Romana and Brax both, which they gladly return. Once he's out of earshot, Romana turns back to Brax. "They're our only reliable advocates—the Warpsmiths, that is. I think we can depend on their support. But the rest of them..." Romana glances around at the room full of faces, beings of a dozen races united by a shared mastery of time. "I don't know how I'm going to win them over," she admits.

"Romana." Leela has just appeared at Romana's elbow, and Brax stands to one side to let her in. Leela doesn't usually make her presence felt at these events, though she's always there in the background, as any bodyguard would be. If she has something to say here, now, it means that... "Something is not right."

Brax is already scanning the room. The Chancellery Guardsmen by the door are standing straighter than usual, subtly scanning the crowd. Leela must have said something to Narvin, or else he's reached the same conclusion himself, because he's stalking deliberately through the crowd, moving from one of his CIA plants to another, pausing to whisper a word in each agent's ear as he passes. Each one gets a sharper gleam in his eye, and their glances swivel immediately to Romana. Brax curses mentally, wondering _how_ Narvin thinks he's been training these imbeciles. If something is happening, they should be watching everyone _but_ Romana. That's what Brax is doing, studying every face as quickly as he can.

"What am I looking for, Leela?" he asks.

"Someone here is wrong. I know the kinds of people here tonight, but this... She must _look_ like a person, but she is not. There is a sound like a machine when she moves, very quiet, but there, and she smells like chem-icals, dangerous ones, and, I think... I was close to her before, and did not think of it until later, but I think there is no warmth in her body, and..." She stops, cocking her head. "There! Do you not hear..."

Brax doesn't hear, but he sees. One of the Time Ladies in the crowd, one Narvin has just moved away from, is holding her arm at a strange, stiff angle, forearm parallel to the ground, and the tips of her fingers have just _opened_. Even if the line-of-sight wasn't a dead giveaway, Brax would know perfectly well what the gun extending from the not-Time Lady's not-hand was aiming at.

There isn't time to wait for words; Brax already has his hands on Romana's shoulders, pushing her aside. But the syllables come out anyway, with scripted inevitability.

"Madam President, get down!"

*

"Read it again," Leela insists.

Narvin, Braxiatel, and Leela are the last three organic life forms left on Platform 87-C, except for the pair of Narvin's agents stationed just outside the door of the reception hall. In accordance with Chancellery Guard protocol, Romana was whisked away back to Gallifrey within less than a microspan of the shot being fired, just time enough for Narvin to get one good look at her, and reassure himself that she hadn't been hit. Then there had been the chaos of a hundred panicked diplomats, half crowding around the apparently de-activated form of the would-be Presidential assassin, the other half trying to get as far away as they could.

Fortunately for them all, Braxiatel has a very booming sort of voice when he tries, and a talent for calming a crowd. Narvin's contingent of CIA agents had been on-hand to aid in the crowd control and guard the lifeless form of the plastic gunman. And those of their terrified off-world guests who might otherwise have grown unruly had thought twice when faced with Leela and her knife. Between the three of them, they had managed suitable apologies to the assembled dignitaries, and seen them all bundled off to their respective transport without further incident.

Through all of it, the being that nearly shot Romana hadn't so much as twitched. The thing that now lies beside the three of them on the ornate Venusian carpet is a near-perfect duplicate of Agent Inagreneriallon, one of Narvin's most trusted operatives. The real Ina, Narvin has been informed by the team he sent searching as soon as he realized what happened, was found bound and gagged in the hold of the TARDIS she used for her last undercover assignment, and has been there nearly a week. Meanwhile, the Nestene duplicate-Ina seems to have entirely shut down. Brax has already been in contact with the Nestene Consciousness. It insists that, while the thing that shot at Romana may have been very like an Auton, the motive force that drove it was not of the Nestene. Narvin finds that very, very difficult to believe, but it's not actually _impossible_ that the thing could be an android specifically designed by some other race to point the blame in the Nestene's direction, or a form once inhabited by the Nestene Consciousness and now controlled by the psychokinetic power of some other entity. Whether or not to retaliate against the Nestene will be Romana's call, and Narvin already knows that her answer will be in the negative, but he intends to have the matter thoroughly and discreetly investigated, no matter what she says.

Narvin's agents tried to take over the task of searching the fallen duplicate, which had shut itself off within an instant of firing on Romana. But Narvin insisted on taking the task himself, no matter what the risk that the thing might re-activate and start shooting again. He had learned that the robes the thing wore were Gallifreyan in manufacture, that even the bullets in its gun hand were organic plastic, and that it was carrying only one thing in its pockets: a signed, sealed letter, written in English, and addressed to _The Lady President Romanadvoratrelundar, by way of whichever of her Merry Men gets to this letter first_. He had taken that last part as more than sufficient reason to open the thing—though only after scanning the envelope for any contagion, explosive or chemical agent he could think of with half a dozen of the miniature devices concealed about his person, and only once he and the other 'Merry Men' were left alone.

"I've already read it once, Savage," says Narvin, irritably.

"Give it here, Narvin. It won't disintegrate the moment it leaves your hands, and I don't think any of us are so enamored of your dulcet tones that we will weep for a change of reader."

Grudgingly, Narvin hands the letter to Braxiatel, but only once he's certain he's memorized the thing. Brax clears his throat, shakes the pages out with a dramatic flutter—Narvin rolls his eyes—and launches into his recitation.

 

 _My very dear Madam President,_

 _You must realize how deeply it pains me to have resorted to such a step, my dove, but business is business. My plastic friend was under strict orders not to harm a precious golden hair of your head this time around, and I do hope he has kept to his brief. I believe in your powers of reason, you see, and so I thought I'd just give you a chance to reconsider. You know that this war is going to happen, and I know that you're the reason it hasn't happened already. I don't consider myself an impatient man, my Lady President, but then, patience is a virtue, and virtues are a luxury no man in my position can afford. And when you, Madam P, are the only thing preventing me from getting what I want..._

 _You see how it is. I do hate to be so pedestrian as to issue outright threats. I'm sure you see by now that you can't stand in the way of my lovely little temporal war forever. Make it easy on the both of us, Romana. Just give in and let it happen. Then we needn't ever go through all of this again. While I hardly like to mention it, you really ought to know that if there should ever be a next time, I can't see my way clear to instructing the gunman to miss. And that, I think we can both agree, would be a terrible loss to the universe at large._

 _Do think it over, won't you? And the rest of you standing over her shoulder—Chancellor, Coordinator, Savage—you consider it for yourselves. Our Lady President may not be deterred by threats to her person, but I have a sneaking suspicion that the rest of you may feel somewhat differently about it. I'm certainly not so proud as to mind you doing my work for me. Listen to what they're all going to tell you, Madam P. Your nearest and dearest would hardly steer you wrong. And neither would your old dear friend Arkadian, now would I?_

 _Yours, while the ages steal (or while there's anything in the ages left to steal, at any rate),_

 _M.A._

 

None of them was quite sure what to say after their first time through the letter. None of them is quite sure what to say now either. Now, as then, it is Leela who finally breaks the silence.

"Can he do what he says?"

"Get at Romana?" asks Narvin. "I would say no, but I would have said no before tonight, too." He catches Braxiatel's eye, and then looks away. "I'm not sure enough to stake her life on it," he admits.

"Is there any convincing her to stop fighting against this war and start preparing for it?" says Brax.

"I have tried," says Leela. "She will not listen to me."

"Nor to me," says Braxiatel.

"I've been trying for months," says Narvin, his voice tight. "And here we are. She still thinks that if she can figure out how to apologize for temporal interference without apologizing for temporal interference, she can stop this war from coming. She won't ever admit that it stopped being about temporal interference a long time ago, and became plain and simply about the rest of the universe hating us. And there's no way she can talk them out of that."

Brax is lost in thought. Narvin doesn't doubt that if it were only the two of them, there'd be nothing more said about it. But 'lost in thought' isn't Leela's way of doing things, and for once, Narvin appreciates her insistence on action.

"And so what are we going to _do_?"

*

"I'm going after him myself," says Narvin, pacing rapidly across the sitting room of the Presidential suite. "I won't let him get away with this, Romana. We've got a few minor leads in our investigations—not very promising, but enough to start. I'm going to chase down every single clue we can possibly get our hands on, and I'm going to find him."

"Mmm," she says, in a vague sort of assent. She's at her desk, a much smaller model than the monolith in her proper office, just a little writing surface in her private quarters that he never knew her to use, until the last few months. Now he finds her here more often than not when he arrives home in the evenings, hunched over and studying reports or writing memos and correspondence. When she falls asleep at all, it's as often here as in their bed.

"If you can spare her, I'll bring Leela with me," he continues. "I hate depriving you of such a loyal bodyguard, especially now, but chasing down the root of the problem is a better way of protecting you than just trying to react to Arkadian's latest moves, and the Savage is useful for this sort of thing. Tracking is what she knows. Is it all right with you, if I take her with me?"

"Yes, fine," says Romana, not looking up from her papers.

"You'll still have the whole of your guard, of course, and Castellan Wynter is loyal. He'll see to it you're kept as safe as possible while we're gone. We'll leave first thing in the morning. Andred can handle the CIA while I'm away, he knows enough to keep the wheels in motion for a few weeks, at least." Narvin pulls a datapad from his pocket, sends a quick message to Andred, informing him of the plan and asking him to fill Leela in. "We should try to go as far undercover as possible," Narvin muses. "It'll be best if we don't make any calls back to Gallifrey at all, not unless it's absolutely necessary. Anything could be traced. Of course, Arkadian knows me personally, and Leela for that matter, but if he gets near enough to us to notice, we'll have already won. Being given away in advance by our tech is much more likely."

"Mm-hmm," she agrees. He finally stops pacing, and just looks at her.

"You haven't been listening to a word I've been saying, have you?" he asks.

"You're going hunting for Arkadian and taking Leela with you," she says, attention still on the report in her hand.

"Romana," he says, "you were nearly shot about a span ago. Could you perhaps put the work down for just a few microspans?"

"No."

He crosses the room and spins her chair, turning her to face him. "Perhaps I should rephrase," he says. "I'm about to go away from you for weeks, maybe months, Romana, and I'll rarely be able even to speak to you in all that time, if that often, and I'm only doing it because I came much closer than I'm comfortable with to losing you tonight, and it..." He hesitates, and then admits, "I was afraid, Romana. I'm still afraid. I won't stop being afraid until I've caught the man who arranged for your very near assassination tonight, and I _will_ catch him. But before then..." He touches her cheek, her chin against his palm. "Put down your papers, and give me a proper send-off." He leans down and kisses her once, gently. "Please."

She looks up at him, a conflicted, guilty expression on her face, and stands. "Oh, all _right_ ," she sighs, and wraps her arms around his neck. "But do try not to take all night about it, Narvin. I have important things to do."

He stares down at her for a moment, incredulous. It takes a hell of a lot to make him forget what he sees in her, especially when she's standing right in front of him, but then this has been a hellish night. His voice huffs out in a soundless, humorless laugh. "Well, then," he says, taking her wrists and pulling her hands off of him as he steps away, "I won't detain you from them any longer. Forgive the interruption to your evening, Madam President, and enjoy your next few weeks. Perhaps by the time I get back, you'll have saved up the necessary fifteen nanospans to say you missed me, and possibly even sound as though you mean it. And try not to get yourself assassinated any time soon. It would be so inconvenient to be called home early for the funeral."

He's nearly gone, by then. "Narvin," she says, sharply, but before she can continue, the door is closing behind him.

*

Narvin hasn't slept in his own quarters in years. They come with the position of Coordinator, and so there was no question of getting rid of them, and no reason why he should. But he's been living in the Presidential suite for so long now that these spartan rooms don't feel remotely like home any more. Still, everything is exactly where he left it. The staser under his pillow, for example, the one he draws instinctively when something moving in the dark wakes him in the first few groggy microspans of sleeping.

"You seemed earlier this evening to be against the idea of people pointing guns at me," says Romana's voice, wry and weary. "Have I really annoyed you _that_ badly, Narvin?"

He sets the staser aside, carefully. It's barely out of his hand when Romana swings herself onto the bed, straddling his stomach, her knees pressing into his ribs. "Madam President," he says, sourly, "to what do I owe this..."

"Shut up," she says, and kisses him.

It's the first time she's kissed him and meant it in a very long time. He's almost forgotten what it feels like for her to _want_ to kiss him, instead of just accepting his embraces as some kind of obligation, or sparing him the occasional absent-minded peck from sheer force of habit. But this is a real kiss, and it feels like a regeneration, like destruction and rebirth. It hasn't been the sex he's been missing, not really. It's been this: feeling chosen, being sure that he's here because this is where she wants him to be.

All right, so it's not impossible that he has also been missing the sex.

It's still fast and hard and urgent, but not, for the first time in months, the kind of urgency that comes of having only so many microspans to spare. It's the kind of urgency that comes of unbearable degrees of self-denial, emotional even more than physical, of needs grown finally too strong to be resisted. It's the urgency of Romana burning too-hot in his head, all the passion of so many kinds that she's been tamping down while she strives for peace redirected, channeled into him, into fervent lips and clutching hands and naked skin sliding against his. She nudges the right switch in his mind, and suddenly all of his own frustrations are pouring out, too: the times she has brushed him off or turned him away, watching her grow thinner and paler and more and more withdrawn, listening as leaders of other worlds patronize and insult her without either of them being able to fight back, being afraid for her with nothing to do with his fear.

Every single thing that this not-war has done to them, to each of them and the both together, is raging destructive and raw through their shared mindscape, creating itself in the blooming purple bruises of his fingers on her hips, the angry crimson gouges of her fingernails across his back, in clashing teeth and too-hot skin and the way she cries out when he presses inside her. They nearly roll themselves off the bed fighting for dominance, and just this once she lets him win, lets him hoist her legs up over his shoulders while she fights to keep their foreheads touching, their minds as tightly knitted as possible. She's rocking against him, and he's driving deep with every thrust, and inside their skulls he's begging her to say his name. She does, and again, the edge of a whimper in the syllables, and then she's echoing the sound of her need into every corner of his brain.

He's so close he can barely think, but he finds the bright and growing core of pleasure in her mind, and ghosts it across a dozen relevant neural receptors, stimulating every erogenous zone he can think of. And then he's pressing down hard, overloading her every pleasure center as he speeds the pace of his hips to a furious rhythm. She actually screams with the intensity of it, and he thinks that sound alone would be enough to drive him over the edge, even if her orgasm wasn't flooding his head and tightening her around him, even if she wasn't warm and sweet and perfect and _his_ , and more beautiful than he's ever had any right to, and the only woman who's ever made him feel anything remotely like this in all his lives. She may drive him mad as many days as not, but hers is the only kind of madness he'll ever want.

"Narvin," she says, some while later, when he can practically breathe again, "my legs are aching, and you're crushing me more than a little."

He sighs, and commits himself to the herculean effort of levering himself off of her. She immediately rolls into his orbit, pressing up against him as his arms slide around her.

"Romana," he says, into her hair, "you can't keep working yourself like this."

She groans. "Now, Narvin? You're going to lecture me _now_?"

"You can't change the minds of the entire temporal community single-handedly. I know you don't want to accept it, but..."

He's cut off by her teeth in his shoulder, nipping playfully at his skin. "This is my _one_ night off, Narvin. I'm not sleeping with you ever again if you're going to be so little fun afterwards."

He turns his head to look at her, smirking. "Somehow I doubt that."

"Just you watch," she says, kissing him lazily, a smile on her lips. Then she sobers. "I suppose I oughtn't to throw stones," she admits. "I've hardly been particularly enjoyable to be around recently myself, have I?"

"Oh, I don't know," he says, lightly. "I have no complaints about the past span or so. The few months before that... Well, I've known you in more charming moods."

"I've been intolerable," she admits. "But, Narvin, this is something I have to do. It there's any way of preventing a war, any way of stopping this...I _have_ to try."

"I understand that," he grants, "but that isn't the same as expecting to do everything yourself. You need to share your burdens, Romana, you can't..."

"I am the face and the voice of Gallifrey," she says. "There can only be one of those."

"That's nonsense. Every Time Lord on this planet is the face of Gallifrey. You're just the Time Lady who gets to do all the dirty work."

"Says the Coordinator of the _CIA_."

"Exactly. I know what I'm talking about. You _can't_ personally change the minds of every Sunari, Yevnon, Monan and Nekkistani in the entire universe, Romana. Frankly, I don't think you'll change the minds of a single one of them..."

"How wonderfully supportive of you."

"...but you've got to grant that you'll have a better chance of success if you let your own government do its job. When was the last time that any of our ambassadors took a single call from any representative of the other temporal powers? They're sitting around doing nothing while you micromanage every detail."

"I can't trust any of them to comprehend the full ramifications of..."

"Then fire the lot of them, and appoint better ones. You don't need to be negotiating supply treaties, you don't need to play the charming hostess to every cabinet under-secretary of every species that's ever developed the technology to leap them back to last week, and you don't need to personally..."

"I _do_ ," she says. "It's my responsibility, it's my job, it's my fault..."

"Your fault?" he asks. "You aren't... Oh, of _course_ you are!" He rolls onto his side, so he can look at her properly. "You're _blaming_ yourself for all this, aren't you? You think that if there is a war..."

"It was my call, Narvin," she says. "I wasn't even President then, but I'm the one who made the call. _I_ erased the civil war. I was the one with the Key of Rassilon in my hand, controlling the Eye of Harmony, and do you know what it felt like, Narvin?"

"Felt like?" he asks, bemused.

"It wasn't just like flipping a switch. The change of time...it went...it went _through_ me. It happened _in_ me. It felt like..." Her eyes have gone somewhere else, somewhere far away from him. "It was more than anything I've ever felt before, so much more that 'more' isn't a good enough word. It changed me, every single bit. While it was moving through me, I was...I was a goddess. I knew everything, I was everywhere, and I was forever. I was the universe, for a moment. It was in me, and it was me. And it was _glorious_." She focuses on him again, then, and her expression is half fervor and half terror. "There's a price, Narvin. There's _got_ to be a price, for something like that. I accept that, and I'm paying it. I won't let my planet die because I played with forces I could never understand."

He doesn't blame himself being unable to respond at once. He's fairly certain there was never a class at the Academy on what to say to your lover when she's just admitted she used to be omnipotent, and if there was, he must have missed that day.

"Romana," he manages, "this isn't about some kind of... cosmic retribution. You haven't tempted the wrath of some higher power and brought doom down on your people. You're far too rational to believe that. You made a choice that was right for your people, and it annoyed a lot of foreign diplomats, that's all." He smirks at her. "Can you honestly look at me and deny your own skill in the art of exasperation?"

She grins back, and tangles her bare feet up with his, her toes tickling his ankle. "Maybe not," she agrees, "but you needn't worry, Narvin. None of the rest of them are nearly so amusing to annoy as you are."

"I'm very glad to hear it," he says, sliding a hand to rest in the bare hollow of her spine, and pressing her into a kiss. She hums into his mouth, and galactic politics suddenly seem far less important than her thigh hooking over his hip, and her breasts pressing into his chest, and her tongue sliding over his.

Narvin is more than prepared to delay the rest of this conversation in favor of more pressing matters, but she doesn't let things get far before putting a few inches of distance between them again, kissing the corner of his mouth as she pulls away.

"Even if you're right," she says, and it takes a moment to force him to remember what he's meant to be right _about_ , "changing the timeline was still my choice, Narvin. Even if I didn't do anything more than make the other temporal powers angry, _I_ made the other temporal powers angry. It's still my responsibility to see it put right."

"And I hope you can," he says, "but you don't have to do it all by yourself."

"No," she agrees, smiling. "I do delegate _some_ things, you know. Stopping Mephistopheles Arkadian from turning the entire rest of the universe against us is quite an important assignment, for example, and I've put two of my best people on that."

"Important," he agrees, thinking of laser blasts flying within inches of Romana's head, "and difficult, and very far from home."

"Very far," she agrees, faux-solemn.

"And all the _comforts_ of home," he says, running his eyes slowly down the length of her naked body.

"Oh, I don't know," she says, with a grin. "A TARDIS is hardly the worst place to spend a few weeks. You'll have as much space as you could possibly want, designed to your exact specifications, and the matter replicators in these newer models can duplicate anything you could possibly want to eat. I can't imagine what sort of luxury you think you'll be lacking."

"Can't you?" he asks, circling a fingertip on the soft skin of her thigh. "Well. Perhaps I'd better demonstrate the sort of thing I'll be missing."

"Yes," says Romana, her lips hovering just over his, "I think you better had."

With how little sleep Romana has been getting lately, Narvin thinks he should probably feel guilty that they're both awake to watch the suns rise. But of all the morally questionable actions in the life of a CIA Coordinator, not one in the night after Romana's near assassination ever troubles Narvin's conscience in the slightest.

*

When Romana kisses him goodbye in his rooms that morning, Narvin thinks that no other woman has ever kissed him like this—or perhaps it's him that's different, but in either case, it's all because of her.

"Do try to behave yourself while you're out wandering the universe," she advises. "Gallifrey has enemies enough as it is."

"It's the Savage you've got to worry about there. I'm not likely to start an interplanetary incident by pulling a knife on the wrong alien."

"No," Romana agrees, "you're likely to start an interplanetary incident just by being yourself."

"You don't seem to have any complaints about me."

"I complain _perpetually_ ," she points out. "You just don't listen."

"And I think it's been a very effective system so far."

"Not half bad, now you mention it," she says, smiling, and then she's kissing him again. He pulls away as soon as he can possibly force himself to do so, which is admittedly not very soon.

"I'll never get out the door, if you keep on like that."

"Out the door is overrated. Stay here instead."

He shakes his head. "Mephistopheles Arkadian had you shot at last night, Romana. I don't trust this hunt to anyone else, not anymore. The stakes are too high."

She bites her lip, her eyes going warm as she struggles not to smile. "Narvin," she says, "we've discussed this. You aren't allowed to say things like that to me. Go on like that, and soon enough you'll have me believing you're a nice man."

"I am not and will never be a nice man," he says, "but I'm smart enough to know a good thing when it's standing in my arms with practically no clothes on."

"Referring to me as an 'it' and a 'thing' in the same sentence," says Romana, wryly. "Now _there's_ the Narvin I know. You do know how to charm a girl, Coordinator."

"Take care of yourself, Romana," he says, sliding a hand into her hair. "Watch your back, and be safe. For me, if you won't do it for yourself."

Later, he will remember the strain in her smile, and the fact that she never gave him an answer. But then, all he thinks is that she kisses him like no other woman has ever kissed him—or perhaps it's him that's different, but in either case, it's all because of her.

*

"You are late, Narvin," says Leela, as he enters the CIA TARDIS bay.

"Can you even tell time, Savage?"

"I do not need eyes to feel the suns on my face, nor must I be a Time Lord to hear what they tell me."

"This is my operation. _I_ say when we go."

"If you think you can treat me as one of your spies, you should think a second time, Keeper of Lies. We hunt together, because we both want to see the same prey brought to heel. But you are not in _charge_ of me."

"Can you fly this TARDIS?" he asks, as they step in and he reaches for the controls to close the door.

"You know that I cannot."

"Then it seems I'm the one in charge, doesn't it?"

Faster than his eye can track, she reaches to her hip, and then something flies through the air. It passes so close to his right ear that he's left with a loud silvery ringing that goes on long after her knife buries itself in the wall behind him.

"You would do well to remember that you can fly this machine without ears," says Leela. "Or several other parts that I think Romana would not be at all pleased with me for cutting off, and that you would be even less pleased to part with."

"Charming as always, Savage. Remind me again why I agreed to bring you along."

"You _asked_ for me to come. You need my nose, and my instincts, and my blade."

"Yes I do, Rassilon help me." He sighs. "Well. Either we'll figure out how to work with each other, or one of us will murder the other, I suppose."

"Or we will go on just as we always do, and drive each other mad."

"Or that," he agrees. "Suddenly, I'm getting the feeling that this is going to be a very long trip."


	3. Janus Thorn

Narvin hasn't really expected that Romana would come to meet him and Leela when they arrived back on Gallifrey, but he had been unable to entirely quash a certain forlorn hope. The only face awaiting Narvin and Leela in the CIA's TARDIS bay is Andred's, however, and it does nothing for Narvin's mood to watch the way the Savage glows when her husband wraps his arm around her waist and kisses her lightly on the lips.

"That's quite enough, Agent," he snaps.

"Be quiet, Narvin," says Leela, and doesn't pull away from Andred as they all walk from the TARDIS bay. "We have both been away for a very long time."

"Six weeks isn't so long that I've forgotten what sort of behavior my agents ought to..."

"He is doing nothing that should offend anyone at all. It does not offend _you_ ; you are only angry that Romana is not here. Now go and bother her, and leave us alone," says Leela, irritably. "I am sick of you, and perhaps she will even be glad. I do not know _why_ , but..."

"Leela," says Andred, nervously, in the tone of a man who wants to keep his job, and whose wife is in the process of berating his immediate superior.

"If you think I want to spend one more microspan with you than absolutely necessary, Savage..."

"You'd think the two of _you_ were married," Andred grumbles.

Leela and Narvin both turn to glare at him. She has a surprisingly good glare, Narvin thinks, for a woman who can't actually see what she's glaring at.

"I take it from your mutual good mood and the lack of any apparent prisoner that you didn't find Arkadian," Andred observes.

"We chased down every lead we could possibly find, and did at least manage to locate a few of his usual haunts," says Narvin. "If he comes back to any of them, we'll have him."

"He will not come back," says Leela. As she's speaking, they pass through the front doors of the CIA and emerge into the early morning suns. "A rabbit can scent when the foxes have been in his den."

"If I have to listen to _one_ more inane metaphor..."

"I am taking my husband home," snaps Leela. "I do not care _what_ you do, Narvin, so long as it is far away."

She stomps off in the opposite direction from Narvin, dragging Andred by the arm. "Sir," he calls over his shoulder, "permission to..."

" _Go_ , for Rassilon's sake, if it gets her out of my hair," says Narvin, watching them walk away.

He should go to his office. He's been away for Leela's idea of 'a very long time.' There will be at least three dozen highly urgent and highly confidential messages awaiting him. On the other hand, he's been on a mission, one with a specific objective. He ought to make a formal report as soon as possible. The only members of the government sufficiently high-ranking to hear such a report are the Chancellor and the President, and both of them ought to be in the Presidential Complex at the moment. So he might as well just head in that direction anyway.

CIA headquarters is only a ten microspan ride from the Presidential Complex, but it cannot possibly be fast enough.

"Coordinator!" says Areliane, Romana's chief secretary, looking up from her desk as Narvin enters Romana's outer office. Areliane has dark circles under her eyes, but she gives him a very pleasant sort of smile. Areliane has always approved of Narvin, which has made his life a great deal easier. He probably ought to stop and make small talk someday, except that he hates small talk like the plague, and the day he has time to slow down enough to be polite has never come yet and isn't ever likely to.

"Good afternoon, Areliane," he says, which is the closest thing to a pleasantry he's got in him. "Does she have a moment?"

"She hasn't had a moment for anyone or anything in four months," says Areliane, "but I think she'll make one for you."

"Thank you, Areliane," he manages, before he's all but bolting for Romana's door.

She doesn't look up when the door opens. She's bent over her desk, scribbling frantically away at something, and doesn't even seem to have heard him come in.

"Romana?" he asks, as he strides across the wide expanse of her office.

She looks up with a jerk, and he blinks at the sight of her. She's so _pale_. She always has been, but the only time he can remember seeing her like _this_ , she was propped up in a hospital bed, just after the end of the civil war. For the first moment after she looks at him, she doesn't even seem to register who he is. And then her brow furrows, and she blinks, and one corner of her mouth quirks in a way that looks as though she would like to smile, but has forgotten the proper procedure.

"Narvin," she says. "You're home."

"As a matter of fact, I am," he agrees.

"That's...nice," she says. Then she seems to remember something, and her eyes light up. "Did you catch Arkadian?"

"Don't I even get a hello, first?" he asks.

She hasn't even risen from her chair. He plants his hands on the arms, leans in, and presses a kiss to her lips. On his part, it has all the makings of a proper greeting between lovers separated for some six weeks, passionate and full of promise. But she doesn't even move, doesn't respond in any way whatever. She just sits still and lets him kiss her, and it's barely more than a moment before he pulls back to stare at her.

"Am I overreacting," he asks, "or are you not at all pleased to see me?"

"Don't be silly," she says, vaguely. "Did you catch Arkadian?"

"Not yet," he says, confused by her manner. There's something wrong about the way her eyes are moving.

"Why not?" she snaps, looking sharply at him, properly focusing on his face for the first time since he arrived.

"We've laid down a series of traps for him, but the kind more likely to work if we're nowhere nearby when they're sprung," he says.

"Oh," she says. "Well. That's...I suppose that's fine. Yes. Fine. You must have...things to do. I'll see you..."

"Romana, what's _happened_ to you?" he asks. The vacant look is back in her eyes, the expression on her face vague and bemused.

"Nothing," she says. "I'm perfectly fine. I have work to be doing. It is nice to see you, of course, Narvin, I..."

Something is very, very wrong, and she's obviously not going to come out and tell him. Bending over her, he touches their heads together.

"Narvin," she says, not as strongly as he'd have expected. "What are you..."

Her mental defenses are weaker than he's ever seen them, and she's not actively trying to keep him out. He's inside her head within a moment. It's even more obvious here that something isn't right. Her whole mind is hazy, misty, and there's a quiet throbbing coming from somewhere near the back of her mind, on a more instinctive, primal level than her active consciousness. He follows the trail of that pain, and gasps as he rounds a corner of her mindscape, and sees what he's come to find.

Across two prominent sections of her mental space stretch enormous artificial barriers, the sort that no healthy mind would ever house. If they had come from outside, her mind would be raw and screaming at the intrusion, but these, for all that they are far from natural, are clearly of native manufacture; Romana _must_ have put them there herself. The entire cortex of her brain that houses her emotions has been sternly barricaded, padlocked and sealed, only the tiniest trickle of feeling escaping through the cracks. She's left her conscience unaffected and in-tact, to prevent herself becoming completely psychopathic, but even so, the idea that she can't feel _anything_ is horrific. It's no wonder she didn't react to his kiss; with what she's done to her brain, it can't have registered with her as anything more than an expected and acceptable bit of physical behavior, no more or less significant than a handshake from a colleague.

"Romana, what have you _done_ to yourself?" he breathes.

"Nothing," she says. "It's nothing, Narvin, you needn't... Stop that! Narvin, _listen_ to me..."

He doesn't stop to think about it. It may be her mind, but if he found her cutting herself to pieces he wouldn't hesitate to pull the knife from her hand, and this is a no less blatant act of self-destruction. Her voice grows suddenly insistent as he forces the gate in her head open. He's nearly swept out of her mind by the brute force of six weeks of repressed emotions rampaging through her head, and forces his own mind firmly shut against the onslaught. He would take his share of the tumult of feeling flooding her, if he could, but one of them needs to stay level-headed through all of this, and it can't be her.

"Why did you _do_ that, Narvin?" she screams. She can be a strident woman at times, to put it mildly, but this is completely out of control. She's feeling everything exponentially more strongly than she should, and will, for at least a little while, until all that stored-up emotion can be brought back under reasonable control. "How _dare_ you interfere with my _brain_? You could have..."

He ignores her, and turns to the other mental block she's erected, one that worries him even more deeply. Forcing herself not to feel her own emotions is bad enough, but turning off her receptiveness to _physical_ cues is even worse. It's unbelievably dangerous, not allowing herself to hear what her body is trying to tell her, and in this particular case, the price could be unthinkable. Romana has built a mental wall between her conscious mind and the neural receptors that process fatigue. She won't have been able to sleep at all while that was in place. She can't even tell when she's tired, is incapable of becoming exhausted—and, from the towering height of those walls, she hasn't been able to feel those things in a long time.

Narvin's blood beats cold just thinking of it. The Time Lord physiology can withstand a considerable time without sleep, but certainly not forever. If Romana has had that barrier up since he left, if she hasn't slept in six full weeks, she might _literally_ drop dead at any moment, without warning, and very probably without enough strength left for a healthy regeneration.

"No," he says. "No, _no_."

He finds himself desperately tearing at that wall in her mind, shoving and battering it, ripping it down as quickly as he possibly can. She's still shouting and protesting, but she doesn't seem to be rational enough just now to actually try to pull out of his reach and break their mental contact. With one last shove, he finally succeeds in toppling the mental block, and pulls his head away from hers, quickly breaking their contact, and catching her by the arms.

Romana's eyes go very wide for a moment. "Narvin," she whispers, her eyes already beginning to close. "What...did you..." She slumps forward, unconscious.

"Romana," he mutters to himself, as he's propping her gently back in her chair. "Romana, you stupid, _stupid_..."

As soon as he's certain Romana won't fall, Narvin dashes to the door. "Lantion, Henzil, in here, now," he barks, to the pair of Chancellery Guards posted at the door of Romana's outer offices. "Areliane, call a medical team, highest priority. And summon Chancellor Braxiatel. The President has collapsed."

The office springs into action. "What happened, sir?" asks Henzil.

"What _happened_ is that she hasn't slept in _six weeks_ , and none of you could be bothered to do anything about it!" Narvin shouts. "Didn't _anyone_ think..."

"I did," says Brax, striding through the door and into the outer office. "I hadn't realized it was as bad as that, but it's been obvious that she hasn't been well for weeks. I did try to persuade her to see a doctor."

"Why didn't you insist?"

"She's the President of Gallifrey and the most stubborn woman in the Seven Systems, Narvin. Precisely how much good would you expect my insistence to do?"

"You should have staged a damned _coup_ rather than let it get this bad!"

The medical team rushes through the door, just in time to meet the two guardsmen, who have magicked a stretcher from somewhere.

"Not all of us are so fortunate as to be forgiven our acts of treason, Narvin," says Braxiatel, sourly.

"Well, you've got the Presidency now anyway, until she wakes up," snaps Narvin. "I hope it does as well by you as it's done by her. Now go Acting President."

"Thank you, Narvin. I would certainly have forgotten my own job without you here to remind me."

Narvin glares, but doesn't bother trying to reply. The medical team is carrying Romana away, and shouting at Braxiatel, however cathartic, is far less important than this.

"How are her vitals?" he barks at the nearest medic, striding alongside the stretcher, inside the cloud of flustered Time Lords frantically scanning their President with a battery of medical equipment of all descriptions.

"We haven't had a chance to..."

"Well work faster!"

"Temperature and pulses are low. High level of delta wave activity; she's somewhere short of comatose, but just barely. Were you with her when..."

"Yes."

"If you could describe..."

"There was a mental barrier in her brain, preventing her from sleeping. It was a threat to my President's physical and mental safety. I removed it."

"How did you find..."

"I went looking for it!"

There is a small medical bay just down the hall from Romana's offices; the President's health is meant to be a significant priority, Narvin thinks wryly. The medical team are lifting Romana onto a medi-dais and settling Narvin into a chair beside her, even as they continue to poke and prod and scan her, still flinging questions Narvin's way.

"Do you know how long it's been since she last slept?"

"I don't know precisely. Weeks, certainly. It could be nearly fifty nights."

"She couldn't have survived fifty nights without sleep."

"She's stronger than she looks."

That isn't saying much, just now. Just now, Romana looks as breakable as spun glass. He lifts one of her hands, delicately, and holds it clasped between both of his. Her skin is cold, but he can feel her hearts beating, sluggishly, in the veins beneath his fingers. He gives in and asks the obvious question, the one every man in his situation since the dawn of time has been required by cosmic law to ask.

"Is she going to be all right?"

"She should be," says the medic he's been interrogating, pulling a syringe full of blood out of Romana's arm and glancing up at Narvin. "I've never seen such a severe case of exhaustion, but if that's the worst of it, there shouldn't be any lasting damage. She'll be unconscious for a full day or more, and she'll be physically drained and need long nights of sleep for several weeks, but if she takes proper care of herself..."

"She won't." He swallows hard, trying to scowl down at Romana's sleeping face, and ending up, he doesn't doubt, just looking worried. "She did this to herself in the first place. She won't take care of herself, and she won't let anyone else take care of her, either. She..."

Narvin remembers suddenly that he's talking to a stranger, not anyone he has any reason to even begin to trust. There are rules, he has learned, to being the man in the President's bed. He can't think who could have made them—it certainly wasn't him, and it doesn't seem to have been Romana—but there are rules about what he can and can't say, and to whom, and they're far more detailed and less obvious than simply refraining from public discussion of any of the many things the Imperiatrix of Gallifrey can do with her tongue. Discussing Romana as though she were a person, a Time Lady with weaknesses to match her strengths, is, for example, against the rules, no matter how much he may need to vent.

"Can you drug her?" he asks. "No, never mind can; just do it. Keep her asleep as long as she'll need to build up her strength."

The young med tech stares at him in astonishment. "I can't possibly do that, Coordinator," she says, aghast. "Even if she weren't the President of Gallifrey, it would be unethical, and she _is_ the President of Gallifrey."

"It would be unethical to save your patient's life?"

"It would be unethical to keep a patient under unnecessary sedation, and it would be _treason_ to keep a President from her office longer than absolutely crucial for her health."

"Everyone is very keen on that word today," Narvin grumbles. "Am I the only one who's actually more concerned with her health than with seeing her back behind that desk?"

"No," says a voice from the doorway. "You are not."

"And here I thought I was finally going to be rid of you for a few spans, Savage."

"You should have told Areliane not to summon me, then."

"No, I shouldn't have," says Narvin, pulling another chair beside his. Standing, he gently takes Leela's arm, and guides her to her seat.

"How is she? What has happened? Will she be all right?"

Narvin glances around him. Seemingly contented with the readings on the medi-dais, and having stuck Romana with the requisite number of needles and auto-injectors for the present, the medical team have scurried off to the next room to analyze samples. "She did this to herself, Leela," he says, bitterly. "The only two people in the universe who care more about the Lady Romana than about the Lady President were both off trying to save her life, and she took it as an opportunity to...to turn herself into some kind of automaton."

"What is an auto-mat-on?"

"A robot. A machine." Leela's fingers are sliding along the edge of the medi-dais, mapping it by touch. Narvin lifts her hand and moves it to Romana's wrist, so Leela can feel her hearts beating. "She'd grown so angry and frustrated and battered that she just...turned off her own emotions. Went into her own brain and changed things, forced herself not to feel anything at all. And she was so desperate to work harder that she hasn't been letting herself sleep, or even feel that she was tired. She sent the two of us away, and then scrapped herself for spare parts, as though she were nothing more than a disposable brain on legs. Now that I think about it, her K-9 wasn't around either—I'd imagine it tried to stop her, and she shut it down."

"Braxiatel..."

"...says he tried to talk to her," sighs Narvin. "But you know how she is, Leela. It would have been hard enough to make a dent if it'd been all three of us fighting her at once. He didn't stand a chance all on his own."

"Did she know that this would happen?" Leela asks. "Did she know that what she did would leave her like this?"

He's stopped himself thinking of the worst of it, until now. He scrubs his hands across his face, plants his elbows on his knees, and rests his forehead on the heels of his hands.

"No," he says, "not _this_. She didn't seem to have any intention of letting a minor coma get in her way. She thought she was just going to keep on with it for the few more days until she simply dropped dead."

Leela swivels her head sharply in his direction. "You are wrong," she snaps at him. "That is a lie."

"I'm not wrong," he says. "Do you know how much I wish I was wrong? I would say it was a miracle she was alive now, if I believed in that kind of thing. Organic beings can't _survive_ without sleeping, Leela, not indefinitely, not even Time Lords. We could very easily have come home too late."

"It is not true!" Leela insists. "I _know_ Romana. She would not do this thing! She does not give up so easily."

"She would. Are you forgetting that she was prepared to die to stop Pandora? This _was_ her way of not giving up. Stopping this war is more important to her than whether or not she's still breathing tomorrow." He looks down at Romana's slumbering form, something sick happening in his stomach. "No matter _what_ the rest of us might think about it."

"How can it be that she fights so hard, and yet she does _not_ fight? I do not understand this diplomacy of yours, Narvin. These other worlds, these other people she speaks to—are they our friends, or our enemies?"

"Oh, most definitely our enemies."

"They would like to kill us?"

"Undoubtedly."

"Then why do we not kill them first?"

"Because Romana thinks that if she smiles very prettily and works very hard and gives the other temporal powers everything they can possibly think to ask for, they may decide murdering us all in our beds simply isn't worth their while."

"You do not think that it will work."

"No, I don't."

"I do not think so either."

"Well, if I've got _you_ on my side, Savage, that's all my worries gone." It's a single-hearted attempt. If he can't even sound properly sarcastic when talking to _Leela_ , he's not sure there's any hope left for him. It's feeble enough that she doesn't even bother answering back.

"It is to us to do the killing, if she will not."

"Are you the President of the Time Lords these days?" he says, a better approximation to scorn this time. "I take my orders..."

"Stop that," says Leela, sounding more tired than he's ever heard her. "We are on the same side, Narvin. Save your anger for those who deserve it."

"I can't fight the people who deserve it."

"Why can you not?"

"I've just told you..."

"You have told me why Romana does not. You are not Romana."

"I serve the Office of the President, Leela."

"I do not care about that!" says Leela, standing and beginning to pace, carefully but quickly. "I am not asking what you do from behind your desk in your office, Narvin. I am asking what you will do for Romana. Do you love her, or do you not?"

"That isn't any of your..."

"Oh, you Time Lords and your words! Do you _care_ about her, then? Do you want her to live?"

"Yes," he says, voice wound tight as an overcoiled spring, "I want her to live."

"Then _do_ something about it!" Leela shouts. "It is her enemies that have made her this way. She would not have chosen to do this to herself if there were not wolves at her door that she is afraid to slay. I am not afraid, but I do not fight the way you fight. My blade is hungry for the blood of the people who have done this, but I do not know who they are, or how to find them. You do know these things, Narvin, and yet you do nothing! What is the _good_ of you, if you will not even fight for her life?"

"I _can't_ , Leela!" He stands in his turn. "Don't you think I've spent the past five months thinking of all the things I can't do? We _should_ be preparing, there _is_ a war coming, we've got enemies on all sides, we should be _fighting_ , and I can't any more than you can! I've done what little I can manage to prepare the planet, but it isn't nearly enough. I know _exactly_ what we should be doing, but if I tried, she'd only stop me. I serve the Office of the Presidency. I serve Gallifrey, and Gallifrey sits behind her desk. I have her express orders, and no matter how many people seem to disagree right now, I'm no traitor. What do you think, Savage, that I'm _happy_ about that? Do you think I'm _pleased_ that my planet is in danger and Romana is barely alive? Do you suppose that the prospect of losing _everything_..."

"Narvin," says a very weak whisper that nevertheless stops him in his tracks, "you're very...noisy."

"Romana!" He kneels beside her bed, so that their faces are at a level. She hasn't even opened her eyes. "You're supposed to be asleep."

"Where am I?"

"You're in the medical bay. Just down the hall from your office."

"Take me back...to my own...bed," she slurs.

He looks up at the medic who has reappeared beside the medi-dais. Narvin raises an eyebrow, and the medic nods. "The tests indicate nothing worse than pure exhaustion," she says. "What she needs most is rest. If she thinks she'll sleep better in her own rooms, we can come in to check on her periodically there."

"Good," says Narvin, shortly. He's already horrified to think how much of his conversation with Leela the medical team likely overheard, behind their glass wall across the medical bay. He looks back to Romana, and lays a hand on her shoulder. "Will you promise to sleep, if we take you back home?"

"Don't think...I have much choice."

"Good," he says again. He hates having an audience, but there isn't time to care about that right now. He bends his head forward to rest it against hers. "Sleep, Romana," he says, wrapping the word in psychic suggestion and nudging it into her mind. Her head droops instantly, as whatever slight hold she'd gained on consciousness ebbs away again.

Narvin stands, and dusts his hands on his robes. "You go ahead of us, Savage, and you, help me with this medi-dais," says Narvin, to the medic standing opposite him. "Let's get the Lady President back home."

Narvin broods all the way down the hall. The booted footsteps of half a dozen Chancellery Guardsmen falling into step around them aren't enough to drown out Leela's words ringing in his ears. He doesn't give a damn what the Savage thinks of him (that's a lie, and he knows it's a lie, but it's one he'll allow himself to tell), but it's impossible for him to ignore her accusations when he's believed them himself for months. He knows Leela only chose the charge of inaction because she's chafing under her own enforced stillness, but that doesn't mean it isn't true of him as well. Searching for Arkadian was the best either of them could do, for Gallifrey and for Romana, but it hadn't really been the point, and both of them had known that. Everywhere they went, they heard whispers of war on the wind, the breeze carrying the scent of the oncoming storm. Gallifrey is defenseless, and Romana will die before she admits to the truth that is staring her in the face. And Narvin hasn't done _anything_ , and there isn't anything he _can_ do, and he's going to lose his mind with the situation in the very, very near future.

They're passing through the doors of Romana's outer office now, their strange little cortege surrounding Romana's sleeping form on her floating medi-dais. The office is teeming, every Time Lord and Lady who can possibly drum up an excuse to be here standing around to chatter and speculate and wait for news of the President's position. Narvin barely has a moment to wonder whether bawling the lot of them out will make any difference, when Captain Henzil barks, "All non-essential personnel will vacate the Presidential Offices _immediately_!" in a tone that brooks no equivocation. Narvin promises himself that he'll speak to Romana about having Henzil promoted to Commander as soon as he can spare the time, and devotes himself to personally glaring at every one of the hangers-on currently scurrying through the door.

As soon as the crowd has thinned sufficiently to let them through, the group around the medi-dais begins to push forward again. As they're passing, Braxiatel emerges from the inner office and stands by the door. He catches Narvin's eye and inclines an eyebrow.

"She's fine," says Narvin. "She'll be fine."

Brax nods, and the Sash of Rassilon rattles slightly around his neck. Narvin opens his mouth to say something about seizing power with both hands, or enjoying this too much, or any of the sorts of things Braxiatel merits just for being Braxiatel, and then he blinks, as something occurs to him. He closes his mouth, and blinks again, and then Romana and her retinue are passing into her personal quarters, and Brax disappears from view.

Narvin is silent as they pass through Romana's living quarters and into her bedroom. He doesn't say anything as they lift her from the medi-dais and get her settled into bed, the medic checking her vitals once more and nodding in satisfaction.

"I'll be back in a few spans," she says. "If she wakes up, summon me at once."

Narvin nods.

"Sir," says Henzil, saluting. "I'll double the guard on her doors, in case you should need anything."

"Thank you, Henzil."

"You will be wanting me to go away as well," says Leela, rather sharply, as the others disappear. "Well, I..."

"I want you to stay," says Narvin, a little distantly.

Leela stops. "Oh," she says. "Well. That is all right, then."

"But I think..." He's doing exactly that, just as hard as he can, and has been since the sight of Brax in Romana's doorway set a series of bells to clanging in his head. He can't _believe_ it didn't occur to him sooner. He must be going soft. He doesn't know whether or not he should be blaming himself for failing to see before what an opportunity he has at this moment, or blaming himself for seeing it now. He knows how Romana would answer that question, but he isn't Romana, and she put herself in this damned position with both eyes open. If she doesn't like the consequences, it's no one's fault but her own.

He takes a breath and forces himself to be calm. He can't do this just because he's angry at Romana. He is absolutely furious with her for doing this to herself and to him, for treating her own life as such a valueless commodity when he happens to rate it as more important than anything else he can imagine. But that can't be what this is about. If he does this, if he acts on the plan that is just taking shape in his mind, it has to be because it's not only right, but necessary. He's going to have to defend it to both the universe and Romana, afterwards, and he has to be absolutely sure. And he has to be sure _now_ , because he's only got until Romana wakes up to make this happen.

"I know that," says Leela, interrupting his reverie. "It is all that you _ever_ do."

"What?" he asks.

" _Think_ ," says Leela, irritably.

He looks up at the Savage's set jaw, and that, somehow, is where his mind makes itself up.

"Not today," he says. "Today I have things to do. Will you stay with her for a while, Leela?"

"I have just said that I would. What are you going to do?"

He looks at Leela. "Exactly what you want me to, Rassilon help me," he says. "I'm going to go get you your war. And when she murders me for it afterward, Leela," he looks down at Romana, and tries not to wonder just what he is getting himself into, "do try to stop her throwing my carcass to the pigrats."

*

" _What_ are you doing here, Narvin?"

"Oh, nothing, nothing at all," says Narvin, sidling his way into the Presidential Office. "That is to say, I came to wish you congratulations! Acting President Brax."

Braxiatel raises an eyebrow. "I'm fairly certain you've never even attempted to call me 'Brax' before, Narvin, and when one adds _congratulations_ to the mix... You're going to try to kill me, aren't you."

Narvin laughs, far too loudly. "What a sense of humor, Acting President! After everything we've been through together? How many centuries has it been? We're practically brothers, you and I."

"Oh good _lord_." Brax leans back in his chair, staring up at Narvin. "I can't decide whether to discourage you, or to let you go on being sycophantic. There _is_ something just a bit exquisite in the sheer grotesquerie of it, I must admit."

Narvin forces a sickly-sweet smile onto his face. "I'm so glad you're enjoying it, Acting President."

"And then again, it's a much more than a bit revolting. Stop groveling and tell me what you want, Narvin."

Narvin sighs, half in defeat and half in relief. "Only what you want," he says. "I know you hate me, Braxiatel, and I assure you that the feeling is mutual, but you're a patriot, just as much as I am. I can respect that. You care about protecting this planet, and you don't think Romana's going about it the right way, any more than I do. And right now, you've got the power to do something about it."

Brax studies Narvin minutely. Narvin doesn't squirm, for all that it makes him feel like a germ beneath a microscope. "Supposing that I believe it possible that her Excellency's policies are not entirely infallible," Braxiatel says, carefully. "On which specific point do you suppose her judgment to be at fault?"

"This war is going to happen." It's the one thing none of them is allowed to say. The Lady Romanadvoratrelundar, Lord High President of Gallifrey, says there will be no war, and woe to the Time Lord who disagrees. But Narvin knows she's wrong, this one time, and he knows that Brax knows it, too. And if Romana cannot face the fact, they've got to be the ones to do it for her. "It's _going_ to happen, and we need to be prepared. We need to be arming ourselves, and training our troops, and we need to do it now. We can't wait for Romana's optimism to wear out."

"If we begin a program of armament on any significant scale, Narvin, the rest of the temporal powers will take it as a declaration of war. It'll be official within the month, if it isn't official by tomorrow."

"And if we don't, it'll be official within the month anyhow, but we'll be that much less prepared."

"It doesn't give me any pleasure to admit it—for several reasons—but you're probably right."

"Braxiatel," says Narvin, gritting his jaw, "you of all Time Lords _know_ I'm right." He gives Brax a piercing look. "Don't you?"

Generally, Narvin tries to forget about the Braxiatel Collection and the very illegal meetings that take place there. He doesn't ask Brax about his knowledge of the future, mostly because Brax wouldn't tell the whole truth anyway, and possibly wouldn't even hint at it. But Narvin knows he won't lie about this.

Brax has a better poker face than anyone else Narvin has ever met, including races physically incapable of displaying emotion on their faces at all. But his eyes narrow now. He considers. And then his lips purse.

"Yes."

It catches Narvin's breath to hear it. He'd thought he was sure, but there's sure and there's _sure_ , and knowing for certain that something so enormous is coming makes his chest hurt. The only thought small enough to register fully in his mind, of the million shoving for purchase in his headspace, is that he's never understood Braxiatel a bit, before, and now he does, and he can't say he enjoys it.

"Then we have to do this," says Narvin. "You have to, Braxiatel. While you've got the power to make it happen, no matter what Romana says. You've got to see to it we're defended, and now."

"Coordinator," says Brax, quietly, "you're asking me to be the Time Lord who starts the war that cracks the entire universe."

"I'll propose it. I'll write the bill. I can have it ready within three spans. All you have to do is call the emergency council session, and not veto it once I get the thing passed. Blame me if you need to, but don't stand in my way. That's all I ask."

"And why would you choose to be the man to lead the charge?" Brax asks, suspicious.

"Isn't 'all of us, including me, are that much more likely to die if I don't' reason enough?"

"No," says Brax, as though it's the most obvious thing in the world. "This is Gallifrey, Narvin. The likelihood of catastrophe, mayhem and destruction isn't nearly enough to get in the way of _politics_."

"I'm not nearly so ambitious as you are, Braxiatel."

"No, you aren't. But that doesn't mean you're inclined to stick your neck out, when you could work quietly in the background."

"There's only so much any one of us can do in the background."

"Don't be tiresome, Narvin, we both _know_ there's something more. Tell me the truth, and then maybe I'll consider trusting you."

"I'm doing it for her!" Narvin snaps, abandoning himself to truth as his last possible resort. "Dammit, I won't let her..." Narvin stops, breathes, and begins again. "Romana has already worked herself to collapse trying to stop this war, and that's not even _considering_ the assassination attempt, and she'll be out of that bed and fighting again the moment she's even near to conscious. She'll _kill_ herself this way, and if the first shot of this war should manage to get in while she's still breathing, she'll insist that the best place for her and her white flag is right between two opposing banks of guns. Her stubbornness has its place, but this time it's going to get her killed." He holds Brax's eyes. "I will not allow that to happen, no matter what the cost. I won't, Braxiatel. And I know damn well that you won't, either."

Brax studies Narvin's face, and for a long moment, there is silence between them. And then Brax breaks it. "There will be an emergency meeting of the High Council at four bells this afternoon," he announces, simply. "Be ready."

Some part of Narvin feels as though he and Brax should shake hands. He's very glad, however, that Brax doesn't try, just disappears through the door, leaving Narvin alone. He's got a very important bill to be writing, and very little time to do it in, but for the first few moments, all he can do is stand stunned, in silent contemplation.

He's about to become the Time Lord who starts the war that cracks the universe.

*

Shortly after four bells, local Gallifreyan time, Coordinator Narvin stands up before the High Council of Gallifrey, and clears his throat.

Shortly after six bells, local Gallifreyan time, the High Council of Gallifrey passes a bill stating that, given the state of intergalactic tensions at the present time, the Gallifreyan army is to immediately begin training a combat force of quintuple the size of the standing army, that all government laboratories ought to shift their priorities to the design of weapons and defense systems and the protection of troops, and that the shipyards on Arcadia and the manufactories on Dortox and Therolon should be granted sufficient budgets to increase production by 1,000% within the month.

Shortly after nine bells, local Gallifreyan time, a missive from the High Monan arrives on Acting President Braxiatel's desk. He doesn't need to open it to know that it contains a declaration of war.

Eighteen microspans later, the Lady President Romanadvoratrelundar stirs in her bed, rolls over, and opens her eyes.

*

"Narvin?" Romana asks, groggily, as soon as she can force her eyes to focus. "What's happened?"

She's in her own bed, and she can tell she's been there for quite a long time. That would be worrying enough, even if Narvin weren't sitting in a chair beside the bed, holding her hand.

"You collapsed," he says, something strained beneath his gentle tone. "You've been asleep for nearly twelve spans. How do you feel?"

"Not...awake," she mumbles.

He smiles. "Of course not."

"Fix it?"

"You shouldn't even be awake yet."

"Fix it, Narvin."

He almost always wakes before she does in the mornings, and, usually, when they have the time, they're both more than contented for him to watch her as she yawns and stretches and slowly wends her way to consciousness. He teases her still about how sluggish she is after waking, but she knows he loves seeing her that way, in a state so far from her cool, competent public persona. But every now and then, for a change of pace or, recently, for much more practical reasons, he'll slip his mind into hers as she's waking up, and set about neatly and efficiently tucking away the remnants of sleep overcrowding her consciousness—as effective a wakeup call as a dousing in cold water, but a great deal more pleasant for them both.

He hesitates for a moment, but then he leans down and touches his head to hers. Only once he's nearly finished dusting the cobwebs from her mind is she aware enough to realize why it feels strange: he's keeping his own mind shut against her.

"What's wrong?" she asks, as he's pulling away from her. "Why are you so quiet? And why are you all the way over there?" The guilty look is off his face in less than a moment, but not quickly enough to stop her noticing. "What are you hiding from me, Narvin?"

"If all it took was asking, I wouldn't be hiding it very well, would I?" He makes a weak attempt at a smile. "I would think you'd want your CIA Coordinator to be better at keeping secrets than _that_."

She sits up, sharply, and almost immediately falls back onto the pillows, her head swimming. "I don't want either my CIA Coordinator _or_ my lover keeping secrets from _me_ ," she points out. "Come here, Narvin, don't make me crane up at you. It makes my neck ache."

He looks her over for a moment, as though he may refuse. Then his face softens and he slips into the bed, turned to face her. She presses up against him, her face to his chest, as his arms snake around her. "Whatever it is, tell me now, Narvin. You're safe; I've not got energy enough to get angry right now."

"I'm not worried about you getting angry." His arms tighten minutely. "But I know once I've told you there will be no keeping you in this bed, and you need to rest." He considers for a moment. "Well. And I might be a _little_ worried about you getting angry."

"If I promise to rest for another few spans at least, will you tell me?"

"You'd break that promise."

"Then I'll just get out of bed anyway, whether you tell me or not."

"I doubt you can even stand."

"You know that doubting me only makes me more determined. For Rassilon's sake, Narvin, _tell me_."

He pulls back far enough to study her face. His expression makes her nervous; he's far too serious. He leans in and kisses her in a way she can't ever remember him kissing her before, almost painfully earnest, and that makes her more nervous still. Then he pulls back, and takes her hand.

"I'm sorry, Romana," he says, very softly, "but the war has started."

She stares at him, unspeaking, unmoving, only her eyes growing wide. "What?"

"The war," he says, taking her other hand in turn. "The one we knew was coming. The Monans sent a declaration of war just a few microspans ago. Braxiatel has already given orders that the transduction barriers on Gallifrey and all protectorate worlds are to be set to maximum, and all Gallifreyan diplomats and ships summoned home immediately except those on missions specific to..."

She's half out of bed before she realizes she's moving. "The Monans?" she interrupts, as she's stumbling in the direction of her closet. She has to get to her office. If she has to drag herself there in her nightgown, she'll do it, but the Presidential robes would be very much preferable at this particular moment. "What are they _doing_? I spoke to the High Monan _yesterday_ , I was sure I'd... Have shots been fired? The Monans must have allies—have there been other declarations? What has been done to protect the Vortex, and stop this becoming a conflict of endless temporal regression? Is there legislation in the works for a draft on Gallifrey? What..."

"It's expected that the Nekkistani at the very least will declare with the Monans within the day; there's been a preemptive strike at Gryben which so far the transduction barriers have been able to deflect; I have a plan for Vortex security but I'm not sure you'll like it; and the Gallifreyan people will be very, very unhappy with the idea of..."

"They'll just have to get over it." She sways as she's trying to pull on the arms of her robes, stumbling, and Narvin appears, catching her by the elbow. "We can't fight a war without troops, and mercenaries aren't trustworthy. At very least, we'll need Gallifreyans for officers, and to see to the technical side." She gives up fumbling clumsily at her own buttons and digs the heels of her hands into her eyes. "Why now, Narvin? What happened to provoke this? I was hanging on by my fingertips, but I was hanging on. I was going to stop this, I was sure... It can't just have been that I was out of action. Oh, I'm sure that played a part in the timing, but that's not a reason the Monans can give to their own people. What's their reason, what's their game? I know they've been waiting for an excuse, but I've been so careful not to give them one!"

He's doing up her buttons, and doesn't look at her. "There was a law passed in the High Council today," he says, quietly. "I suspect that's become the Monan rallying cry."

"What kind of law? There wasn't supposed to be any High Council session today!"

"As Acting President, Braxiatel agreed to an emergency session. And it was a law to strengthen Gallifrey's defenses."

"Strengthen them _how_?"

"A shift in research priorities." He straightens her robes. "Training of additional reserve troops." He finally gives in, and looks up at her. "Weapons."

Her jaw trembles—and not with weakness. "Weapons," she repeats. "My own High Council went behind my back while I was _unconscious_ to publicly order the building of guns and bombs, when I'd been fighting tooth and nail for _months_ to preserve a crumbling peace and avert this war? Of course the Monans took it as grounds! What did those idiots expect would happen? What were they _thinking_?"

"That even you can't stop the planet spinning around its suns, Romana," he says, "and that, given the inevitability of this conflict, we have to be protected."

"Dammit, it _wasn't_ inevitable! I was _stopping_ it, I could have..." A wave of dizziness sweeps over her, and she's falling before she can stop herself. Narvin grasps her by the arms, controls her fall, so that they end up sitting on her closet floor, she half-collapsed against his chest. "Maybe I still can," she breathes, sounding weak even to her own ears. "Maybe if I... If I reassure the Monans that... If there haven't yet been casualties, our own people won't..."

"Romana," he says, urgently, his voice cracking with incredulous weariness, "you _can't_ stop it. War has been declared. It's _begun_. It's too late for diplomacy."

It can't be true. It _can't_. All her months of work, the peace she's been working herself to the bone to maintain—it can't all have been some futile, childish dream. There must be a way to set this right! What would the Doctor do? What stupid, reckless, foolhardy, brilliant plan would he have to set all this right? She's so tired, she can't think, but there must be a way to fix this, there _must_...

Except there isn't. The Doctor would never accept the Presidency, and she knows that this is why. Being President means sometimes being the one to fight the war, instead of fighting _against_ the war. It means she's going to have to send endless numbers of her people off to die, and see it only as a sad necessity. It means that she's got to be more committed to victory than anyone, when all she wants is not to have to fight at all. But she _doesn't_ have to be happy about it, especially not when the choice wasn't her own.

"How could Brax let this happen?" she fumes. "I'm out for a few spans, and he can't manage to hold the planet together? And what bloody idiot was blind enough to propose that law, _knowing_ the razor's edge we were balanced on?"

Narvin doesn't say anything. She raises her head, and looks at him, with a sudden stab of doubt. "Narvin?"

"He let it happen because I asked him to," he says, quietly. "And the bloody idiot you're looking for is right here."

She leans back, slowly, staring at him in absolute disbelief. "That's a very bad joke, Narvin."

"If it were a joke, it would be a very bad one, yes."

Her breath is rattling strangely, and she cannot seem to blink. " _Why_? Why would you possibly..."

"It wasn't going to work," he says, heavily. "Romana, I know you were giving everything you had, but it could never have been enough. It might have been today, or a week from now, or a year, but you couldn't have stopped this war forever. I did what I thought Gallifrey needed."

"I trusted you, Narvin," she says, the words slow with disbelief. "You're supposed to be on _my_ side. You may not always agree with me, but of all the Council, of everyone on this planet, of everyone in the _universe_ , you're the one person who's not supposed to stab me in the back. You're supposed to believe in me, Narvin! What..."

"Oh, _don't_ play the innocent," he say, suddenly cold. "It doesn't become you, Romana. Of the two of us, you think _you're_ the one who's been betrayed?"

Her eyes flash. "And what precisely am _I_ supposed to have..."

"What precisely?" he asks. "What you did, _precisely_ , was shove me out of the way so I couldn't interfere with your lovely little suicide mission! Did you think I'd forgotten that part?"

"And was business was that of yours?" she snaps. "I did what I had to do for my planet, Narvin. There was only one of me, and I was losing. I was _losing_ , Narvin, there wasn't enough of me, there weren't enough spans in the day, and I thought, well, either I'll get this done, or I'll die trying, and Brax will manage to stabilize the situation once I'm gone. He couldn't have failed, with a president willing to sacrifice herself for peace as his set piece."

He's staring at her, incredulity writ large across his face. "You really did know what you were doing," he says, shaking his head in disbelief. "I almost hoped you were just..." His mouth seals tight, and his eyes go hard. "Well, it's done now, anyway. You can't kill yourself to prevent a war that's already started. It's done."

"Yes," she says, coldly. "It is. Now get out of my rooms, Coordinator."

He stops dead, the color draining from his face. "Don't be ridiculous," he says.

"I'm being perfectly rational." She sits up as straight as she can, though the effort makes her shake. "You're the _last_ man I want to see, and I can't very well be the one to storm away from you right now. Fortunately, I am your President, and you will do as you are told. Now get _out_."

"Romana," he says, emotions flashing behind his eyes too fast for her to track them all, "there's politics, and there's us. What I did today was politics. Don't confuse the two."

"You're the one who seems to be confused. What about 'get out' is proving so difficult for you?"

He's beside her in an instant, his arms wrapping tight around her. "This part," he says, and then his mouth is pressing firmly against hers. Her lips curl away from his in disgust, and she shoves against his chest as hard as she can manage. At the moment, she's so weak she feels as though she can barely make an impression, but it's enough to make him stop kissing her, anyway.

"Take your hands off of me," she says, in a voice she saves for very particular moments, one of absolute command. "You will not touch me. You will not _ever_ touch me again."

She's never seen his face like that. He looks innocent, like she's just cut him so deep that a thousand layers of self-protecting cynicism have fallen away in a single blow to reveal an aching child inside his skin. He lets her go. "Romana..."

"You think you can just kiss this and make it better?" she asks. "That what you did was nothing, and I'll forgive you, just like that? Not this time, Narvin. Not for starting a _war_."

"I knew you'd be angry," he says, "but..."

"But _what_? What do you expect me to do? What did you _think_ was going to happen? That I would say, 'All right, I understand, it doesn't matter because it's you?' Those are my _people_ , Narvin. Millions and millions of _my people_ are going to _die_ in this war..."

"And you would have been the first!" he cries, color rushing into his cheeks. "You would have tied yourself up and presented yourself as a goddamned sacrificial lamb, and they would have torn you limb from limb, and after all of that this war would have _happened anyway_."

"That was _my_ choice to make!" she says, fiercely. " _My_ choice, Narvin. It's my life, and it's my planet, and if I want to die for it that's _my choice_!"

"No," he insists, stubborn. "You're wrong. That's what you've been wrong about from the beginning. I get a say in your life, too, Romana. I have a stake in it, just as you have in mine. It isn't fair to ask me not to fight for you. I don't ask for control over much, but I _do_ get to fight for your _life_."

"Not anymore, you don't," she says. "I am your President, and there's a war on. Do you understand what that means, Narvin? It means I have to send my citizens to die, and I don't get to care whose happiness depends on them. I don't get to see them as people with stakes in their _own_ existences, much less as people with lovers or children or friends. They're going to _die_ , ranks and ranks and ranks of them, and _I_ have to do that. Someone's got to have that responsibility, and it's me. And if I have a right to take away the people that everyone else on this world cares about, I have the right to do the same to you. Possibly you didn't understand that when you signed up for this, but that doesn't matter now. I can't afford you, and I don't want you."

"You're being absurdly melodramatic," he snaps, and some part of her is glad to see the hard edge back in his eyes. It's easier to fight him, like that.

"Am I?" she asks, with a slightly hysterical laugh. "Is that what you think? Maybe so, but it's my job to feel what you get to simply think about. It's my job to care about every single Time Lord I'm about to have to kill. You get to hide behind your numbers and your intelligence, safe and snug in your bunker among your spies, while I send half of Gallifrey to die, and break the hearts of the other half, and I have to _feel_ every single bit of it. Well, the least you can do is give me a little practice. Congratulations, Coordinator. You get to suffer the first casualty of the war."

"Romana," he says, more urgently now, as it begins to dawn on him that she's serious, "Don't make yourself do this alone. You need someone who understands you, who won't let you lose yourself, someone you can..."

"Trust?" She glares at him, her jaw shaking. "Even if I do, you'd hardly fit the bill."

"I did it for _you_!"

"You did it for yourself, don't you _dare_ try to..."

"I love you," he says, quiet and almost resentful. It's been constantly implied, these past nine years, but he's never said it before. Neither of them has ever said it flat-out, not in those terms. "I did it because I love you, and I couldn't let you die. Don't do this, Romana. You're angry—fine, _be_ angry. But don't do this. Don't push me away."

"It's too late," she says. She expects it to sound angry; she _is_ angry, and he's only just told her as much. But when her own voice hits her ears, all she sounds is miserable. "There isn't any going back. It's too late."

He's as white as his robes, but his jaw is set. "I can't accept that," he says. "I'm going to change your mind."

"Nobody has ever managed that before."

"I have," he says, and there's a spark in his eyes when he says it. " _I_ have. You didn't even _like_ me, when we met. You changed your mind about me once. I'll change it again, if it takes me a century."

She laughs, a terrible sound, despair in place of mirth. "Don't you understand, Narvin?" she asks. "There isn't going to _be_ another century. Because of what you did, it's likely there isn't even going to be a tomorrow."

"There will be," he says, absolutely certain. "There will be time enough for us, Romana, if I have to build it with my own two hands."

"Get out," she says. "I don't want you here. I'll still have to see you, I expect, little as I like the idea. I won't fire you for being underhanded; that's what I hired you for in the first place. _This_ was my own fault, for forgetting that. The more fool me."

"Romana..."

"No," she says. "Not Romana anymore. Not to you." She struggles to her feet, against a wave of dizziness so strong it almost makes her sick. Her vision is swimming so badly she can hardly see, but she fixes the outline of him with her coldest stare, jutting up her chin. "Get out of my rooms, Coordinator Narvin. I don't ever want to see you here again."

He stands in his turn. He's only a few inches taller than she is, but he has a way of making himself seem taller when he tries. "I'll go," he says, quietly, "but not forever. The moment you ask it of me, I'll be back."

"That," she says, with a cruelty she only barely has to feign, "will be never." The effort of keeping herself upright is growing intolerable, but she swears to herself that she won't let him see, even once the darkness starts crawling across her eyes.

"I don't believe that," he says, softly but firmly, "and neither do you." He gives a quiet little bow. "Goodbye, Madam President."

Before the sound of the front door has reached her ears, her legs are crumpling underneath her, the world sliding away for the second time that day, and she wonders, in her last moments of consciousness, whether he will hear her fall.


	4. Battle Array

Braxiatel looks up from Romana's desk, and studies the man standing in the doorway.

Normally, Brax would find the temptation to goad Narvin about his sorry state to be one of those pleasures in life best left unresisted. But Narvin has just come from Romana's bedside, and, that being the case, Brax has more important things to worry about. "How is she?"

Narvin doesn't even seem to hear. He's staring somewhere over Braxiatel's shoulder, taking nothing in. "Narvin?" says Brax, louder.

Narvin's eyes dart suddenly to Brax's. "What?"

"How is Romana?" asks Brax, in a ploddingly slow voice that implies the requisite insult to Narvin's intelligence.

Narvin flinches minutely at the sound of Romana's name. Brax bags, tags and catalogues that intriguing fragment of data, earmarking it for later perusal. "She's...fine," says Narvin, distantly.

"How terribly informative," says Braxiatel, not quite rolling his eyes. Narvin doesn't react. "Coordinator Narvin, I'm not certain you've noticed, but at the moment I'm Acting President of a planet that..."

"Yes," Narvin interrupts, "you are. Aren't you?"

" _Yes_ ," says Braxiatel.

"You have all the powers of the Presidency."

"As a matter of fact, I do."

"I resign."

Brax isn't often caught by surprise. He's left blinking for a full three nanospans. "I don't think I can have heard you properly," he says, finally.

"I resign my post. As Coordinator of the CIA. I resign. She would refuse to accept, I think. Or maybe she'd be thrilled. I don't know. But you can accept my resignation, if you do it now. I resign."

"Narvin," says Brax, "I don't even begin to have time for this."

Narvin reaches into the pocket of his robes, and pulls out a small, flat, round device that almost exactly resembles a hand mirror, but for the unnatural nacreous sheen of the glass. He twists the silver rim around the outside, and a sphere of shimmering light about fifteen feet across materializes around Brax and Narvin. The Presidential Office is always quiet, but suddenly even the tiniest background hum is silenced, only two sets of Time Lord lungs breaking the stillness.

"Portable time bubble."

"A not unimpressive little parlor trick, I admit."

"It'll only give us ten microspans. You shouldn't need half that. All you have to do is say that you accept," says Narvin, a pleading edge in his voice. "Four words: 'I accept your resignation.' Surely a small price to have me out of your hair, Braxiatel."

"Narvin, you _live_ for your work. Why..."

Narvin strides over to Romana's desk and snatches up a blank datapad and a stylus. In hasty, inelegant calligraphy, he draws a large circle, and scribbles in the relevant details:

 

 _I, Narvindrasterienableth of the House of Asterion, hereby resign my post as Coordinator of the Celestial Intervention Agency, effective immediately._

 

"Sign it," he says, pushing the datapad back to Brax.

"Tell me why."

"I intend to go off and get shot at," says Narvin. "Does that sweeten the deal enough for you? You'll probably never even have to look at me again, Braxiatel. Surely that's worth a signature."

"What are you on about, Narvin?" asks Brax, in exasperation.

"I'm enlisting," says Narvin, hoarsely. "There's a war on, Acting President. You'll be needing volunteers."

Braxiatel stares at Narvin, shocked and incredulous. "Narvin," he says, "that may well be the most idiotic thing I've ever heard. You are _not_ enlisting."

"I am," says Narvin, a hint desperate. "You won't talk me out of it."

"Never mind the fact that you do infinitely more good in your present position than you ever could as a foot soldier, but you'd put the lives of every man and woman who served with you at risk. Do you know how irresistible a hostage the Monans would find the President's..."

"I'm not," Narvin hastily interrupts.

"Not what, Narvin?"

"Not the President's," Narvin says, turning his eyes down and staring stubbornly at his own shoes. "I'm not the President's anything at all. As of about ten microspans ago."

So _that's_ the missing piece of the puzzle. "Ah," says Brax, in the particular way of saying 'ah' that he saves for moments such as this, the one that makes a banal nonsense syllable seem full of more meaning than the most ponderous of tomes.

"Go ahead, Braxiatel, don't hold back on my account," says Narvin, bitterly. "No 'it was only a matter of time until such an intelligent woman came to her senses?'"

"That would be somewhat petty, under the circumstances," Brax comments mildly. "So you're going the French Foreign Legion route?"

"The what?"

"On Earth, it...oh, never mind. Running away to war to forget about your troubles. Man with a secret, dark past, and one too many memories."

"You said enlisting was a stupid thing to do," says Narvin. "I happen to agree with you. But in my experience, nobility means doing stupid things for the wrong reasons. So I am going to do something very, very stupid." His eyes narrow as he stares at Brax. "And you are going to facilitate that, because it will leave Romana light-years away from me, and in constant proximity to you, and I may not come back at all, and as odds go, no man as shrewd as you are would possibly turn those down."

"And why would a man as shrewd as you are take them?"

"Because," says Narvin, with a hard little smile, "at the moment they're the best ones I can get."

The time bubble flickers, and then disappears completely. "Well?" says Narvin.

Brax watches Narvin for one moment more, and then draws the datapad across the desk. With an artistic flourish of the stylus, he adds his name at the bottom of the screen, with a few more swirls and dashes to indicate his temporary title. "But not," says Brax, pushing the datapad back across the desk, "for the reasons that you think."

"I don't care why," says Narvin. Straightening his spine, he gives Braxiatel a deferential bow. "Thank you, Acting President. I'll leave you to conduct your war, and go get back to mine."

Narvin is nearly across the room when the door slides open, and Leela enters at a run. "I have only just heard," she says, and collides with Narvin's chest before he can dodge. He doesn't say anything, just grasps her by the shoulders and sets her to one side. "There is a war?" she asks. "Where is the fighting? What must I do?"

Brax watches as Narvin heads quietly for the door. "There is very little fighting yet, Leela," says Brax, stopping when she quirks her head at the sound of the opening door.

"Where are you going, Narvin?" she asks. "You were not a coward in the last war. Surely you will not run away from this fight?"

"Quite the opposite," says Narvin, with a grimace. "Braxiatel, before I go, there's a CIA project. Codename Dragon's Breath." Brax raises an eyebrow. " _Not_ my choice of name, but the idea is sound. I would put it into operation immediately, if I were you. And do something for me, Savage?"

"What sort of something?" she asks, warily. Braxiatel would attribute her caution to too much time spent among politicians, except that he remembers how skittish she was from the very first time they met.

"Nothing you'll object to," says Narvin, with the ghost of a smile. "Just take care of Romana for me."

"That is my..." The door closes before Leela can finish her sentence

"Never mind him, Leela," says Braxiatel. "The proper fighting hasn't started yet, but it will soon. We need Romana here, if she's in any state to be out of her bed. Can you go check on her, please?"

Leela nods, and departs in the direction of Romana's private rooms. And Braxiatel slips on the Coronet of Rassilon—he's only ever had this job for a few spans, and he's going to damn well take advantage of the perks while he can—and locates a CIA file called 'Dragon's Breath.'

*

"Romana? Romana!"

Someone is lifting her by the shoulders, pulling her semi-upright. "Narvin?" she whispers.

"No," says the voice, concerned. "It is I, Romana. It is Leela."

"Leela," she repeats, slightly more steadily.

"What happened, Romana? How did you come to be here? How could Narvin leave you, when you are so weak?"

"I was...we were..." She struggles to sit, and manages to lean heavily against Leela's shoulder. "I wanted to get to...the office," she says. "There's a war. I should be there. And...he...helped me to get dressed. And then I blacked out again."

"And Narvin did nothing?"

"He wasn't here. I told him to go."

"That was not very wise of you, Romana. He could have helped you."

"It was _very_ wise," she snaps. "I don't want any of his help."

Leela is stunned into silence for a moment, but she doesn't pry. "Will you accept mine, then?"

"Gladly," Romana sighs.

"Do you think you can stand?"

"You may end up half-carrying me, but I'm willing to try if you are."

"Perhaps you should go back to sleep," says Leela, worriedly. "If you are so weak you cannot even stand..."

"I need to be in that office, Leela. Don't make me order you to get me there. I will, if I have to, but I much prefer to ask."

Leela sighs, and braces her arm across Romana's back, with Romana's own arm slung over Leela's shoulders. "Are you ready?"

"As ready as I will be."

The vertigo when Leela lifts her is even worse than last time. "I'm going to be sick," Romana manages, and Leela hurries her in the direction of the sink. Romana hasn't eaten anything in she can't even imagine how long, and she's so dehydrated that after nothing more than half a mouthful of stomach acid she's left choking on nothingness, shaking as Leela struggles to keep her upright. Getting a glass of water poured and into Romana's stomach, when Romana can't stand unaided and Leela can't see, is the sort of challenge fitted to two women of such indomitable will, but they manage it in the end.

"Can you get me to my office, Leela?"

"Will you be able to sit, once you are there?"

"I can lie on the sofa," says Romana, grimly, "and that's got to be good enough, for now."

Leela nods, and they begin the long and silent hobble across Romana's quarters. From there, it's just across the small antechamber and into her inner office.

Brax stands from Romana's desk the moment the door opens, and hurries over to them. "Permit me, please, Romana," he says, and she nods, thinking he's asking for permission to put his arm around her and help her along as Leela is doing. She's completely flabbergasted when he scoops her up into his arms as though she were a child and carries her to her sofa, but it's all over too fast for her to register any complaint.

"Thank you," she says, for lack of anything better, as he settles her in, tucking her robes fastidiously around her ankles.

"Of course, my Lady," he says, taking the chair beside her. "How do you feel?"

"I'd feel better if I had a clearer idea of what's been going on," she says. "I need to read the bill that passed through the Council today, Braxiatel, and the Monan declaration, and I want your report on what's already been done."

Brax crosses to her desk, grabs a pair of datapads, and returns, handing them over to her. She scans the documents as quickly as she can. The bill is everything she'd feared it would be: no subtlety, no finesse, a practical proclamation in letters ten feet tall that Gallifrey has intergalactic warfare at the forefront of its collective mind. On the other hand, the preparations envisaged in the bill are skillfully handled, the details noted with impressive finesse for a document so hastily composed. Types and quantities of weapons and vessels, specific research projects earmarked for attention, specific allocation of resources indicating a keen awareness of relevant costs... This could never have been compiled in just one day. Narvin must have been considering all of this for months now, keeping the sort of obsessively scrupulous notes that are so typical of him, if he could put together something so detailed in the few spans she was unconscious.

On another day, it would remind her why she chose him to lead her CIA. Today, it makes her _furious_. How long has he been planning this betrayal of everything she's worked for? How long has he intended to stab her in the back the moment he got the chance? How many nights has he fallen asleep next to her, thinking about _this_?

She hasn't got time for him. There are other things to do. _Important_ things. And anyway, he's not the only man in her life who deserves a good swift kick in the head.

"Braxiatel," says Romana, soft and deadly, "your life in the immediate future is likely to become very, very uncomfortable if you can't give me an _extremely_ good reason why I see your signature on this bill. Come to that, I wouldn't mind knowing how there came to be an emergency council meeting this afternoon in the first place. That required _your_ approval."

"I approved the meeting because Narvin asked me to," says Braxiatel, calmly, at odds with Romana's combative tone. It makes her feel like a sulky girl, which does nothing for her already threadbare temper. "And I signed it because it would have been passed in spite of my objections, otherwise. No matter how strenuously you may have fought against this war, Madam President, you can't seem reluctant to fight it now that it's here. That would be perceived as a weakness by our enemies, and would negatively impact morale at home. It was too late the moment that bill was introduced. We couldn't let it be passed over your government's objections."

"I don't _care_ about the politics of the situation! Did you or did you not understand that my policy on this matter was an absolute commitment to peace, Braxiatel?"

"You _should_ care about politics, my Lady. You'll never win this war without them," Brax says, with just a hint of annoyance this time, "and in my Lady President's absence, I did what I thought was right. I have never asked more than that of you, Romana. Do not ask more than that of me."

She stares at him for a long moment, and then purses her lips. "And what have you done since the arrival of the Monan declaration, then?" she asks. "If we can't seize control of the Vortex, this thing is going to get very ugly very fast."

"I've had a suggestion, on that front, Madam President. The sorts of temporal barriers used to divert time travelers to Gryben can be amplified to keep all but the most powerful of timeships from accessing the Vortex; our intelligence suggests that of all the other temporal powers, only the Monans and the Sunari will be able to bypass such barriers on their highest setting. And to deal with them, the CIA has had a somewhat... unconventional defense mechanism in development for some time now."

"Of course they have," she says, sourly. "If this is a CIA scheme, why am I not hearing about it from my CIA Coordinator?"

"The position of CIA Coordinator is currently vacant, Madam President. I received a letter of resignation from the former Coordinator less than a span ago."

Romana blinks, and then presses her mouth tightly closed. " _Very_ nice," she says, less steadily than she'd prefer. "He started the war, and now he's running away from it, is that it?"

"No," says Brax. "He's running _to_ it. He informed me that he intended to enlist for active duty."

 _That_ shocks her into staring open-mouthed at Brax, her eyes wide. For several nanospans, she only goggles, her breath coming unsteadily in a way that has nothing to do with her poor state of health. And then she swallows, and looks down and away, sealing her lips. "And good riddance to bad rubbish," she mumbles, nearer a whisper than proper speech.

"Romana," says Leela, shocked and reproving, but Romana cuts her off, looking up with her jaw set.

"What's this CIA plan for the Vortex, then, Braxiatel?" she asks, trying desperately to sound confident and calm, and sounding like nothing so much as a woman trying desperately to sound confident and calm.

"There's been a program in place for some years now, Madam President, to permit us, in the simplest possible terms, to weaponize the Vortisaurs."

"...I'm sorry?"

"The Vortisaurs, Romana."

"That's what I thought you said. You think we're going to win a temporal war by using giant flying _lizards_?"

"I don't think it can possibly hurt to have an army of temporal monsters at your command, Romana. The CIA has worked out an incredibly effective and reliable method of behavior control, using a combination of sonics, pheromones and psychic suggestion, with a command module effective from anywhere in the Vortex. The moment the Monans poke a toe into the timestream, we can see to it they're mobbed by an angry horde of enormous carnivorous creatures that _eat_ temporal disturbance. In effect, we can make the Vortex so dangerous that it's suicide for anyone but us and our allies even to attempt Vortex travel. It won't be enough to prevent _all_ temporal jumps—interstitial leaps, time corridors and the like—but those are limited, unreliable, and expensive and time-consuming to develop. Claiming Gallifreyan control of the Vortex will be an incalculable tactical advantage."

There is silence for a moment. "Well," says Romana. "When you put it like _that_."

"Shall I see it put into effect, Madam President?"

"It certainly can't hurt to try."

"I'm glad you feel that way," says Brax, "because I already have."

Romana looks at him. She could almost swear he's trying not to laugh.

"Brax," she says, "you're _enjoying_ this, aren't you?"

"The prospect of war gives me no pleasure, of course," says Brax, "but aren't you just a little bit pleased to be able to definitively _act_ after months of delaying and diplomacy, Romana?"

" _I_ am," says Leela. "When will I get to _fight_?"

Romana doesn't answer, for a moment. "Is this what you've been thinking all these months?" she asks, finally. "That this war was going to be a _relief_? Is that what you've thought _I_ was thinking?" She looks from Leela to Brax. They're both sitting up straighter, a little bit uncomfortable. "Is that what you've all imagined was happening in my brain? No wonder Narvin wasn't... What did you think I've been _doing_? Making a _show_ of it? A nice little demonstration of goodwill? Have all of you lost your minds? We're _fighting a temporal war_. The universe as we know it isn't _ever_ going to be the same. The darkest chapter of all of our lives started about two spans ago, and you're _happy_?"

There is a long, chastened silence. "Would it help you?" asks Leela, suddenly. "Would it make your life better, Romana, if we were angry about this? If we hated it as you do? We cannot heal your hurts by hurting with you, and I do not think that it is right for you to want us to be unhappy. You will lead a better war, if your warriors can find pride in the fighting."

Romana studies Leela's face, and, slowly, something unbends inside her. Her shoulders sink. "No," she admits. "It wouldn't help me. You're right, Leela." Romana turns to Brax. "Can you get me information on precisely what kind of attacks have already been made against Gallifreyan timespace, Brax? I need to know exactly what I'm dealing with, so far. And I need a moment alone with Leela."

"Of course," says Brax, standing. "I can be ready to brief you in fifteen microspans, Romana."

"Make it ten."

"As my Lady President wishes," Brax says, bowing. The moment he's gone, Romana turns back to her friend and bodyguard.

"Leela," she says, "I need you to do something for me."

"What kind of something?"

"The kind you won't like, but are going to do for me anyway."

"What kind of something?" Leela repeats, warily.

"You know that Surgeon Master Azeralus can..."

"No," says Leela, immediately. "I do not want..."

"You _should_ want, but that part doesn't matter one way or the other," says Romana. "I _need_ you to be able to see, Leela."

"I cannot see, Madam President, whether you need it or not," says Leela. "I will not let you put your machines in me. I will not let you turn me into..."

"I've accepted your reasons up to now, Leela, but I simply cannot give in on this any longer. If your heart were faulty, I wouldn't give a second thought about putting an artificial one in your chest, whether I thought it'd be what you preferred or not. I hesitated in pressing the point on this, but I can't hesitate anymore. I need you to have the implants, Leela."

"I will not be half one thing and half another," says Leela, fiercely.

"You're a human living on Gallifrey; you're already half one thing and half another! Leela, every Time Lord on this planet is a little bit machine, did you know that? Artron energy, the force that permits us to regenerate, isn't biological; it's technological. Do you think less of me, for that?"

"We are not talking of you, nor any of your Time Lords," says Leela, pacing back and forth across Romana's office. "This is what _I_ choose for myself. I will not let myself grow to depend on something that is in me and yet not me, Romana—something that might fail at any moment, and leave me helpless. I will not be so weak."

"You depended on your real eyes, once. You've adjusted to being without them."

"Yes. I have. There is no need for me to..."

"I'm promoting you, Leela," Romana interrupts. "I need an aide-de-camp, a military adviser. Someone who understands wars, and the psychology of the people who fight them. I would make you my Minister of War, if I could, but there's only so far I can push my own people, especially now. But I can give you the title of Adviser, and, more importantly, I can promise that I will listen, and trust your judgement."

"I do not want your fancy titles, Romana. Words mean nothing to me."

"Words mean more to you than you admit, but I know you wouldn't do it for the title. You'd do it because you care about this planet and its people, however ill you may think of us at times."

"No," Leela shakes her head. "I care about my tribe, Romana. You, and Andred, and the Doctor, and Narvin, and Braxiatel, and K-9. I care about the children at the Academy, because I know them, I have taught them, and because it is always wrong that the young should suffer. The rest of your people mean no more or less to me than the boarsheep on the mountainside, or the flutterwings that sing outside my window in the night. I wish your Time Lords no ill. But if I fight, it is for you, not them."

"That's all I'm asking of you," says Romana. "Fight for me, Leela. Better still, _teach_ me to fight. There are battles that I understand, but they aren't like this. You know that I like having something to struggle for, but killing...it's just such a _waste_. I know how. I've done it before. I'm not innocent, and I'm not squeamish. But I won't kill if I can help it. Even Darkel, after that last coup attempt of hers..."

"You should have killed her, Romana. Even your laws said so."

"I _could_ have had her executed, but why, when imprisonment served as well? She's no threat to me or anyone on Shada."

"While an enemy as deadly as she is draws breath, there is always a threat, however small."

"That's just it, Leela. There are so many things about the mentality of war that simply don't register for me. I can't win this war thinking like myself. I have to learn to think like _you_. I need you by my side, and to be an effective aide, I need you to be able to see."

"Why?" Leela asks, adamant. "You will not even be truly fighting, will you? There will not be blue men in the halls of the Citadel for me to protect you from."

"And if there were, I would trust you to protect me from them just as you are! That's the trouble. War from this side isn't going to be physical. I'm going to spend my days in tracking troop movements and analyzing maps and reading dispatches, and all of those require eyes."

"I would not be any good for those things even if I could see. I cannot think of fighting as words on paper. And even if I could, I cannot read _your_ words, only my own."

"It'll be a learning process for us both, but our strengths complement each other, Leela. We've known that for a long time." Romana smiles, and levers herself a little further upright. "From a purely academic standpoint, I may know more about tactics and the technical side of war, but you've always been better at understanding people, and predicting what they'll do. The two of us, together, looking out over a battlefield... We could be unstoppable as strategists, if we work together. And the question of reading Gallifreyan isn't a problem. That can be programmed into the implants. They can do the interpretation that would usually take place inside your brain, and feed the ideas straight into your mind."

It's the wrong thing to say. She'd been doing so well for a moment; Leela had almost been smiling. And then Romana went and bollixed it right back up again.

"And do you truly think that _you_ would do this, if it were you?" asks Leela. "Let something else tell you what to _think_?"

"It's no different from the telepathic circuits that permit you to understand spoken Gallifreyan, Leela."

"I speak Gallifreyan, Romana."

Romana stops, blinks at her. "What did you say?"

"Are you so used to letting something else hear for you, that you do not listen to your own ears?"

Romana gapes. Leela _is_ speaking Gallifreyan. How could she possibly have failed to notice it before? "I didn't think that was even _possible_ for a human." Leela raises an eyebrow, and Romana hastily adds, "That is... I had never heard of an offworlder learning Gallifreyan before," Romana admits. "I'm sorry, Leela. I didn't mean to make assumptions. You know that I think you're brilliant; don't ever, ever doubt that. But I can't help the occasional ignorant Gallifreyan moment." She gives Leela a sad little smile. "I'm just as blind as the rest of them, sometimes."

Leela has a strange look on her face. After a moment, she crosses back to Romana, and kneels beside her couch. "And that is why you need a blind woman to be the one to see?" she asks.

"You already see more than anyone else I've ever met."

"That is a lie," says Leela, smiling, "but it is a kind lie." Leaning forward, she brushes a kiss across Romana's brow. "You are not like the rest of them, Romana. The rest of them would never think to be sorry."

"Please, Leela," says Romana, sounding nearly as tired as she still is, "please do this for me."

"You always tell me that yours is the work of compromise," says Leela. "I will make a compromise with you. If your doctors can give me false eyes that are not for always, I will take them. If I can use them when you need me, and be only myself, all the other times, then I will do this thing. Is that enough for you?"

"Yes," says Romana, instantly. "That's perfect, Leela. As much as I could hope for, and more than I have any right to expect."

"You expect everything of everyone, but of yourself most of all. Sometimes, you do not remember that that can be harder for us all than what you do ask." Leela's face goes dark. "Narvin says you would have let yourself die, Romana. That you almost did."

Romana opens her mouth to answer, when the door opens, and Brax comes in. "Am I interrupting, Madam President? You asked..."

"Come in, Braxiatel," says Leela, standing. "I was about to leave. And Romana?"

"Yes, Leela?"

"We who love you forgave you, when you would have let yourself die fighting Pandora. We have forgiven you this time. But do not think so little of us as to surrender your life a third time without fighting. I cannot speak for the others, but I will not forgive you again."

Romana studies Leela's face, the grim set of her jaw, and nods. "I understand."

Leela gives a small smile. "Goodbye, Romana. I will see you soon."

Romana thinks for a moment that the phraseology is unusual for Leela. Then the aptness occurs to her, and she smiles. "Soon, Leela."

Brax has already taken the seat across from Romana, in his usual unobtrusive way, and she turns to him as the door closes behind Leela.

"What's the situation, Brax?"

"So far, between Vortisaurs and battle TARDISes, we seem to be keeping the Monans out of the Vortex," says Brax. "Unfortunately, we've also been forced to deny entry to representatives of several other temporal powers, for their own safety."

"And Gallifrey seizing sole control of the Vortex is just the excuse they'll all be needing to join this conflict on the other side," she sighs.

"Yes, Madam President. The Nekkistani were particularly incensed. I'd expect a declaration of war from them within three spans. The Sunari aren't likely to be far behind. The Yevnon are more cautious by nature; they'll sit on the fence a bit to see which way the wind blows, but given the sheer numbers likely to be united against us, I expect them to be officially allied with the others within a few months. The Phaidon..."

"I signed a secret treaty with the Phaidon a month ago," says Romana. "They'll be declaring against the Monans and their allies within the next few days."

Brax stares at her. "I had no idea, Romana."

She smiles wryly. "That's what's usually meant by the word 'secret.'"

He grins suddenly, a there-and-gone flash of teeth that reminds her of an old friend. "Well, yes," he says, "but I've grown vulgarly unused to that word having any meaning for me. Forgive me mentioning it, Romanadvoratrelundar, but I really am terribly proud of you."

"How ghastly of you, Brax," she says, with a tiny smile. "Now, tell me, where have the Monans attacked so far?"

"Our embassy ship above the Host World was destroyed with all hands aboard, two microspans before war was officially declared," says Brax, softly. "Ambassador Quindlerienon and twenty diplomatic staff were atomized. I would recommend immediate evacuation of our embassies on all other temporally-equipped worlds."

Romana closes her eyes, and swallows. "No," she says, the word harsh in her throat. "I'm sorry, Brax, but we've got to show that we're still open to peace. But put them on highest possible alert, and activate temporal shielding within the embassies. I want the interiors displaced five microspans into the relative past, so that any attack will hit the exterior of the embassies with enough warning for personnel to evacuate. It's still not a complete guarantee of their safety, but it's the best we can do for now."

"Yes, Madam President," he says. "Apart from the embassy, and an attempted attack on a Gallifreyan supply convoy which managed to dematerialize away in time, the Monans seem to be preoccupied with strategic bombing of our colonies and protectorate worlds. As you know, the transduction barriers around our other worlds are not of the same intensity as that surrounding Gallifrey itself, as they are not similarly temporally displaced. The Monans seem to be operating on the theory that carpet-bombing Gallifreyan-held planets may weaken the transduction barriers to a sufficient extent that a lucky shot might disable them."

"Could it work?"

"I very much doubt it, my Lady, but on the off chance, I strongly suggest you implement additional methods of aerial defense. At very least, self-targeting laser turrets surrounding all military installations and major population centers, and if our scientists can devise a reliable method of secondary shielding..."

"I'll make it a priority," she promises. "Where has the bombing been worst so far?"

"Sol 7, I believe."

"The taranium mines."

"Yes, Madam President. Therolon has also been badly hit. There's a considerable Monan fleet massed above it."

"The sort of fleet we should be sending a company of battle TARDISes to engage?"

"If the navy believes its troops are ready to face the enemy..."

"Right," sighs Romana. She rubs at her forehead, and lets out a long breath.

"Are you all right, Romana?" asks Brax. "You really shouldn't be out of bed so soon. The medics said..."

"I'll go back soon, Brax, so long as my presence isn't urgently required. But I want reports on readiness from my admirals and generals by no later than five bells tomorrow morning, along with recommendations on recruitment, training and necessary types and quantities of weapons and ships, plus predictions of likely battlegrounds. And I'll need the legislation for a draft drawn up by no later than midday. I don't know that I'll necessarily need it yet, but we should have it in reserve."

"Understood. I'll write it myself, and have it ready by morning."

"If you think there's anyone else who can handle it, let them," she says, looking him over with an appraising eye. "I'm going to need a great deal from you during this war, Brax. I need you to know absolutely everything about every enemy, every ally and every front. I need you to know everything about _everything_. Somebody needs to see all sides of this war at once, synthesize that information, and pass the relevant details on to me. I can't imagine anyone better qualified. Can you do it?"

A smile smile plays around Brax's lips. "Forgive me, Madam President," he says, "but how would that be any different than my job as it stands?"

"Not different at all," she admits. "You'll be my right hand, then, Braxiatel, now as ever?"

"As has always been my honor, Romana," he says, softly.

"Good," says Romana. "Then there's just one more person I need to see where he belongs."

*

It takes a week for her technicians to manage what ought to be an easy feat. It doesn't surprise Romana a bit that her favorite renegade Time Lord is proving difficult to bring home. She once immigrated to an entirely different _universe_ to avoid going back to her homeworld, but she's an amateur in the art of evading the long arm of Gallifrey compared with the man who taught her the meaning of freedom.

Summoning a TARDIS and its pilot back to Gallifrey should be supremely simple, especially a TARDIS that has once been in the hands of the insufferable meddlers at the CIA. There are a dozen safety protocols built-in to every TARDIS to permit a person with the proper authority—the Lady President of Gallifrey, just for example—to do precisely that. But older TARDISes are always more of a bother to reel in, Romana is told, and there are any number of things that a sufficiently clever and unconventional TARDIS owner can do to resist Gallifrey's siren song. The owner of this particular TARDIS is among the cleverest people Romana has ever met, and the least conventional by several orders of magnitude. On the other hand, those methods of resistance require conscious, constant mental effort on the part of the Time Lord piloting the vessel. They can't possibly be sustained forever, and especially not when the Time Lord in question has the attention span of a particularly forgetful goldfish.

When the technicians do finally get a lock on the Doctor's TARDIS, K-9 is automatically informed, and immediately passes the message on to Romana, tail wagging at the prospect of seeing 'the Doctor master' again.

"Well, K-9," says Romana, "shall we go down to the TARDIS bay to meet him?"

"Negative, mistress."

"Negative, K-9?"

"I am analyzing the data being transmitted by Gallifrey traffic control. It indicates that the Doctor's TARDIS will not arrive in the TARDIS bay, mistress."

"I thought they were pulling him in, K-9. Surely that's where they would choose to send him."

"The Doctor master has adjusted the co-ordinates remotely programmed into his TARDIS by traffic control. He will still arrive in the Citadel at this relative time."

"Where precisely..." Romana is cut off by a distinctive grinding wheeze from the other side of her office. "Of course," she sighs. "He never _could_ resist making an entrance."

Within a moment, a blue telephone box has become the defining object in the Presidential Office, completely stealing the scene even in the most important bit of real estate in the universe. For a long moment, nothing more happens.

"Step away from the controls and come out here, Doctor," she calls. "There's no way you'll get away again without the proper authorization, and you might at least say hello, now you're here."

There is another brief pause, and then the door of the police box swings open to disgorge a Time Lord in a bottle-green velvet jacket, with lovely honey-brown curls hanging down to his chin. She's glad to see him in the regeneration she left him in last time; he does go through bodies _so_ quickly. The fact that he's run through more than half of his regenerations already is an idea big enough to drive the air from her lungs. She quite simply cannot imagine a universe without the Doctor in it, and doesn't think she wants to.

"Romana!" he says, and swings her into a hug. "And hello, K-9!"

"Hello, Doctor," she replies, smiling, and K-9 chimes in with an enthusiastic, "Master!" She had intended a sarcastic comment on his attempts to avoid her summons, but it's too simply good to have him home, and somehow she finds that she doesn't want to bother.

"What marvelous timing you have, Madam President. I was just thinking of stopping by. You might just have called to arrange a visit, you know, no need to drag me back like a dog being taken off to the pound. I would have come if you asked nicely."

"I don't doubt that you would have, Doctor—in a month or two. I needed you here _now_."

"Really? Is the planet about to explode? Or implode? Or spontaneously wander off into an entirely new quadrant of space?"

"Is that a thing that planets frequently do?"

"Well, not frequently maybe, but tell _that_ to Altarus Minor when I was there just last week. Turns out it had been sentient all this time, and was just craving a better view of a nearby nebula."

"While I don't anticipate Gallifrey deciding it's a nice day for a stroll any time soon, you may have heard that there's a war on." She gives him a sharp glance. " _Had_ you heard that there's a war on?"

The Doctor scoffs. " _Romana_. Do you really think I could be _that_ far out of the loop?"

She nods. "Then you'll understand that both implosion and explosion are far more likely than I'd prefer just at the moment. And you are the resident expert on averting catastrophe."

"Not _resident_ ," says the Doctor, nervously. "I haven't been a _resident_ for..." He coughs. "Well. More than a few years."

"Seven hundred and ninety four," says Romana, with excessively innocent eyes and a wicked little grin. "I don't think I ever congratulated you on your millennial, did I, Doctor? And that was some time ago now. You must be about one thousand and thirty, aren't you?"

He makes a frantic hushing noise, looking back and forth around her office as though someone may be listening in from beneath a sofa cushion or behind a sculpture. "I only admit to nine hundred," he hisses.

"Well then, I have just the ammunition I need," she says. "You're staying on Gallifrey until the end of this war, Doctor, or I'll make sure every young female with strong running legs, a quick brain and a well-practiced adoring look within a ten-galaxy radius knows precisely how old you actually are. Should put a nice little dent in companion recruitment."

"You _wouldn't_ , Romana," he says, aghast. "Not to me. Not to your old friend the Doctor."

"I'm a politician now, Doctor," she says, with a wry smile. "I'm afraid I've had to learn how to get my hands dirty." She sobers. "I need your brain. I need every advantage I can possibly get."

He turns serious too, studying her face. "Is it as bad as that already?"

"It will be. I'm holding things together with my fingernails, now. It can't last." She sits, and gestures for him to do the same. "I'm trying to do this without causing utter devastation. I'm trying to win this war without resorting to extremes, but there's only so much I can do, especially when I'm fighting the more...vehement elements within our own society at the same time. I've managed to batten down the Vortex, keep the temporal element of the war under strict control, but it's only a stopgap. The longer this war goes on, the more damage will be done both to the timeline and the planets of the universe, and the more tempting it will be to lose sight of morality altogether. There may come a time when I'll be prepared to use any weapon, any tactic, if it seems the way to victory."

"And you want me to stop you?"

"I want you to try. In the utmost extremity, I don't guarantee that I'll always let you succeed." Her mouth tightens. "I have a duty to my people. They must be my first priority. But if you're here..." She studies him. "If you're here, I'll think that much harder about it. Everyone else on Gallifrey will be fighting to push my moral compass in the opposite direction, Doctor. I need you to be the one person to push back."

"Is that an official position? Presidential Moral Compass Pusher?"

"I was thinking of a slightly different title." Her lips curl. "You'll like this one, Doctor. I want you to be the new head of the CIA."

He blinks at her. He blinks at her again. And then he throws back his head and laughs until he's crying with it. "And here I thought you'd lost your sense of humor since you went and grew up," he gasps, wiping at his streaming eyes. "Oh, very _good_ , Romana, very good. But what do you actually want me to do?"

"Doctor," she says, slowly, in the 'you are a very intelligent five-year-old' voice she reserves just for him, "I want you to be the new head of the CIA."

He stares at her. "You're serious."

"Absolutely."

"You're _serious_."

"Yes, Doctor."

"You want me to be _head_ of the organization that captured me, forced my second regeneration, scrubbed my memories, ripped apart my poor dear TARDIS, and stranded me as an exile on a faraway planet?"

"It _was_ your favorite planet."

"That's not the point!"

"You're right, Doctor. The point is that you're one of the few Time Lords who has actually traveled the universe, and I need a head of intelligence-gathering who is capable of actually gathering intelligence. Most of the Time Lords and Ladies at the CIA have barely even set foot off-planet. During Vansell's tenure as head, operatives were trained to spend so much of their time watching fellow Gallifreyans that the wider universe wasn't accorded nearly as much attention as it deserved. Things have been improving since...in recent years, but there's still no one in the Agency with _remotely_ your capacity to understand the inter-galactic situation. And your unconventional method of thinking, however unpredictable it may make you to those of us here on Gallifrey, will also make you unpredictable to Gallifrey's enemies. You're a natural leader, Doctor, and you have a knack for keeping the people who follow you alive." She sighs, and leans back in her chair. "And I _trust_ you. I know it's hardly traditional for a President and CIA Coordinator to trust each other, but I've got enemies enough as it is."

He looks her over. "As I understood it, you trusted your last Coordinator. More than a little."

Her chin raises by a fraction of an inch. "I did. I don't now. That's as much as you need to know."

He quirks an eyebrow and frowns, completely unimpressed. "That would be as much as I needed to know if I were here because I actually wanted this job. That isn't why I'm here at all, Romana. I asked as a friend."

"You're here because I dragged your TARDIS to Gallifrey kicking and screaming all the way."

"Well, yes, but that's not my point."

"I don't wish to discuss it, Doctor."

"I knew him, a little. Know him, I should say. Coordinator Narvin. We'd played the occasional round of hunt-the-renegade. I can't say I was very impressed by your taste, Romana."

"Neither was anyone else," she says, sourly. "Nor am I, at the moment. He..."

" _But_ ," the Doctor interrupts, "the first time I saw a picture of you together, I understood." He looks her over. "I hadn't seen you smile like that in a very long time, Romana. He made you happy, and he obviously adored you."

"I don't wish to discuss it," she says again, more sharply.

"Well, that's too bad. You never had an older brother. I always did think you needed one."

"As though you ever liked having an older brother yourself," she smiles. "How long has it been since you've seen Brax?"

"Ah, no changing the subject. Just tell me what happened, and I won't ever bother you about it again. You know me and my curiosity."

"There isn't anything to tell," she says, quietly. "We hated each other's guts, we realized that possibly we didn't hate each other's guts, we were together for nine years, he started a war while I was unconscious, I told him never to touch me again, he ran off to get shot at. Garden variety romance, Doctor. Dime-a-dozen the universe over."

"Oh, dime-a-dozen," the Doctor agrees. "I've seen the same thing a thousand times."

"Right," she agrees. "And I don't miss him," she adds, abruptly.

"Naturally not." The Doctor nods, solemnly. "That would be ridiculous. I bet you're sleeping at nights, and everything."

"Shut up, Doctor," she sighs. And then, quietly, "It's too cold, sleeping alone. I can't get used to the cold."

"Romana," he asks, carefully, "you aren't...you aren't recruiting me for _both_ of the positions your ex-Coordinator has left vacant, are you?"

"Doctor," she scoffs. "Don't be ridiculous. Do you really think I'm _that_ unsubtle? I promise you, your job description won't involve anything _nearly_ so enjoyable."

"Now _that's_ saleswomanship if ever I heard it," he laughs. "I didn't think so, but one does like to be certain about things like that. The number of times I've ended up in accidental love affairs...and accidental engagements...and the occasional accidental marriage..."

"I promise, Doctor, if I ever decide that I simply cannot resist your charms any longer, I'll do you the courtesy of telling you plainly. Now, I'll have Andred show you to your new office and help you settle in..."

"Wait, wait, hold on, back up. I haven't accepted any... Is that Leela's Andred? Andredossolos of the House of Deeptree?"

"The very same. He's been," she takes a deep breath, "Narvin's right hand for years now. I would have promoted _him_ , truth be told, if only he were a bit older and more experienced, and it wouldn't look like such egregious favoritism to promote Leela's husband."

"And it doesn't look like egregious favoritism when it's me?" he asks, amused.

"Oh, of _course_ not," she says, grinning. " _You're_ an ex-President of Gallifrey, my Lord Doctor. Twice."

"Still, I don't think you ought to risk the public perception of..."

"You're taking the job, Doctor. End of discussion."

"But Romana, I'll be rubbish! I'll..."

"You'll be unlike any other CIA Coordinator there's ever been, true, but I need that right now. I also need an ally on the High Council. But those aren't the reasons you're going to stay. You're going to stay because it'll be a chance to reform the CIA from the inside, and you're going to stay for that other bit. The moral compass bit. You cannot resist an excuse to see yourself as the Hero, and you never have."

"Well..."

"You're conscripted, Doctor. Effective immediately. No arguments. If you give me your solemn word that you'll do the job to the best of your considerable abilities, I'll give you mine that I won't let anyone touch your TARDIS. A saner President would probably ground her, but I know you're a man of honor."

"Oh, well _done_ ," he says, impressed. "You _are_ a politician now, aren't you?"

"You're trying to distract me. It won't work. Give me your word of honor that you won't run away."

"You're asking a leopard to change his spots, Romana."

"What's a leopard?"

"Earth animal. Giant cat. Josephine Baker walked one down the Champs-Elysee on a leash. I've always wanted to meet her, would you like to meet her? Come to Paris with me, Romana. You love Paris."

"Nice try, Doctor. Give me your word."

He sighs. "Oh, all _right_."

"Explicitly, please."

"I give you my word that I'll stay and be a good little Gallifreyan until this war is over."

"Thank you, Doctor," she says, smiling.

Her intercom buzzes. "Madam President?" says Braxiatel's voice.

"Come in, Brax," she calls.

"Oh, no," groans the Doctor.

Brax steps in, and sees the occupant of the sofa. "Oh, no," Brax sighs.

"The Doctor's going to stay with us, Braxiatel," says Romana, cheerfully. "Isn't that lovely? And do be polite, I'm sure you'll be working very closely together. Your baby brother is going to be the new head of the CIA. Aren't you just as proud as can be?"

Romana is quite sure she'll never see such an expressive look of dismay on Brax's face again. It's absolutely _priceless_. "I cannot actually believe the words that are about to pass my lips," says Braxiatel, "but I'm fairly certain I want Narvin back."

Romana's good humor vanishes. "You're welcome to him," she snaps. "Do you have that information on recruitment and training?"

"Yes, Madam President," says Brax. "Through a combination of hypnosis, accelerated instruction and sleep-teaching, our forces can gain all the relevant combat knowledge they need in a matter of days or even spans. Seeing them physically prepared is proving more challenging, however. Millennia of bioengineering have left most of our troops perfectly physically fit with little in the way of training, but developing the relevant muscle memory to permit them to..."

"Nanoscopic temporal field enhancers," says the Doctor.

"I'm sorry?" asks Brax, sourly.

"Nanoscopic temporal field enhancers. Bitsy little things. Let them burrow into the relevant muscles of the relevant soldiers, set them to 'fast forward,' instruct your Time Lords to perform the action you'd like them to learn, and their muscles will think they've been doing it for years."

"That's preposterous," Brax scoffs. "Without repetition..."

"Time Lord muscles are stupid," says the Doctor, cheerfully. "They'll believe anything you tell them." He grins. "Especially the brains."

"Some of them, perhaps," Brax glares.

"It's worth a try," says Romana, looking from one brother to the other, and trying not to smile. "Go see about putting it into effect, won't you, Brax? And make sure that if the army plans on importing field enhancers, rather than manufacturing them natively, they go to the Fifth Great and Bountiful Human Empire, not the Sixth. Production quality plummeted _dramatically_ in the reign of Edward the Fifty-First."

"Yes, Madam President," he says, bowing. As he slips out the door, Areliane slides in, Brax politely extending his arm to let her pass.

"These just arrived for you, Madam President," says Areliane, not quite looking at Romana.

"Paper correspondence, Areliane? Whatever for?"

"Minister Delox decreed this morning that all military correspondence not of absolute urgency should be conveyed on paper, mistress," says K-9, wheeling over from his position by her desk. "There was concern that Matrix communications might be too easily intercepted."

"What _rot_ ," sighs Romana. "I suppose it's not worth fighting him about. Let my Secretary of War think he's actually good for something. Are you _blushing_ , Areliane?"

"No, ma'am," says Areliane, blushing still more deeply.

The Doctor stands and takes the envelopes from Areliane's hands. She hastily makes her escape, without even a 'Madam President,' which strikes Romana as odd. The Doctor glances down at the pile of paper in his hands, and stops dead. His eyebrows shoot up, and his mouth clamps shut.

"Doctor?" asks Romana. "What is it?"

"Oh...nothing," says the Doctor. His jaw is quivering.

"What's wrong?" asks Romana, alarmed.

"Nothing," repeats the Doctor, his eyes darting up to meet hers, too-innocent.

"Doctor?" she asks. "Are you...laughing?"

"No," he says, very ineffectually attempting to hide a giggle in his sleeve. "Nooooo, no, laughing? Me? Me laughing? No. Not at all. Not me. Never." The Doctor glances back down at the envelope, and then up and to the side, clearly trying frantically not to grin. "Have your mail, Romana, go on then," he says, shoving his armful in her direction.

She gives the Doctor one more dubious look, and takes the pile of paper he's proffering. And then she looks down at the topmost envelope, and is suddenly very glad that there is a chair just behind her. She doesn't suppose the sitting down abruptly could have been helped, and if nothing else, at least she isn't lying in a heap on the floor.

"Doctor," she says, faintly, as he inconspicuously pulls all but the topmost envelope back out of her hands and sets them down lightly on the table beside her, "what was that particularly piquant Draconian phrase you taught me on New New New New New New Earth, that night when you insisted on proving that whiskey had no effect on the Time Lord metabolism?"

"Nothing a Lady President ought to know," he says.

"But the sort of thing that would be very useful right about now," she points out. "I'm going to _murder_ him."

"As Presidential Moral Compass Pusher, I'm afraid I have to point out that..."

He's interrupted by a very vehement and sibilant interjection that forms Romana's only phrase of Draconian.

"Oh, _excellent_ pronunciation," says the Doctor, impressed.

"I'm going to _kill_ him, and _then_ I'll murder him," she decides.

"I think it just might be a little bit sweet," says the Doctor.

She gives him her most daunting glare. The Doctor may be a man who has faced down armies armed with nothing but a sonic screwdriver and a smile and come away whistling with his hands in his pockets, but upon meeting with Romana's most daunting glare he does what any even moderately sane man would, and blanches. "In a terrible, terrible way, of course," he says. "Awful. You should have his guts for garters, really."

She sighs, and dares one more look at the envelope. It's just as bad this time. She buries her head in her hands. "Why me?" she asks, of no one in particular.

"I'll just leave you to read it, shall I?"

"I'm not going to read it."

"Yes you are."

"I don't want to read anything he has to write."

"If you don't reply, he's liable to send another one. Can you imagine how many people have seen that envelope on its way here? I suppose letting the planet have a good laugh at your expense is a noble contribution to the war effort, but..."

She gives a despairing little moan. "All right, all right, I'll read it. And yes, go ahead, Doctor. Talk to Areliane, and she'll call Andred over for you; he can show you the ropes. And Leela, if you like. I'm sure she'll be happy to see you."

"Permission to accompany the Doctor master, mistress? I might be of assistance as he adjusts to his new position."

"Granted, K-9. But be back by tomorrow morning, won't you?"

"Affirmative, mistress."

"Goodbye, Romana," says the Doctor. "Come along K-9. How do you like life in the Citadel?"

Romana nods distractedly in their direction, and they disappear, chatting chummily together. Once the door closes behind them, Romana glances back down at the envelope in her hand, and winces.

The address isn't in everyday, colloquial Gallifreyan. It's in Old High Gallifreyan, and a very specific linguistic subset of that tongue. Somewhere in the extremely distant past, before becoming the stuffy, mannered society Romana knows, loves and hates, Gallifrey enjoyed its very own age of chivalry, complete with its own philosophy of romance not entirely unlike that of courtly love. Even as a schoolgirl, Romana found the literature of that era disgustingly sentimental, with its over-the-top declarations and extravagant, flowery phraseology. It's been centuries since she was forced to read any such drivel, but she recognizes in the line of characters before her one of the stock forms of address of the Gallifreyan golden age, the soppiest of the lot.

 

 _To his immortal beloved, the most high Romanadvoratrelundar, noble-hearted, shining-haired, from the lovesick Narvindrasterienableth, most lowly and forlorn of Time Lords, whose hearts weep with unsatisfied longing._

 

It's among the most horrific things she's ever seen in her life. She was once invited to a dinner party on Raxacoricofallapatorius, but this is far worse. On a ghastliness scale of one to ten, it ranks a solid thirty seven thousand and twelve.

Still, the Doctor is right. She'd better read the letter. It'll only make it worse, if she ignores Narvin now. She's not entirely certain how it _could_ be worse, but Narvin is diabolically sneaky. No doubt he could figure out some way of mortifying her in front of even _more_ of her citizens. Sighing, she gives in and slits open the envelope.

 

 _Romana,_

 _Yes, it was a cheap trick. But it got you to open the damned thing, didn't it? No, I won't do it again. I don't intend to go out of my way to make laughingstocks of the both of us in front of half the universe; this was quite simply the only way I could think of to get your attention, when you've made it so very clear that my calls are unwelcome. Now stop making that face. Of course you're not happy to hear from me. Did you really think I thought you would be? You aren't pleased to be reading this at all, or you don't think you are, and I already know that. There's no need to go on scowling as though I could see it through the paper._

 _Among the many habits the CIA instilled in me—yes, I do know that you find those habits distasteful, and the CIA, and especially me—was a tendency to watch for and remember the weaknesses of others. Curiosity is one of yours, Madam President. You may have cut off my access to you through every civilized means of correspondence, but once this letter shows up on your desk, you will open it, and you will read it, because you can't bear not knowing. You will read all of it, and the next one I send, and the one after that. Because I do intend to go on writing, Romana. Once a week, do you think? 'Never is quite soon enough,' is what you would tell me. Frankly, you may tell me whatever you like. I am going to write once a week, and that's all._

 _'Why waste your time writing to a woman who despises you? Isn't one war at a time enough for you? Or have you so enjoyed starting this one that you thought you'd have a go at another?' Yes, I do know what you'd like to say. Except, you don't despise me, Romana, and you don't actually blame me for this war. You're too intelligent for that. You don't despise me, and you do miss me, and I'm damn well going to remind you of it. I'm not going to let you pretend to forget me._

 _You're a difficult woman, Romanadvoratrelundar. You are demanding and prickly and unrelenting in every possible way, besides the fact that being the President's man is a very particular brand of social torture, and I would never have anyone else. Do you understand that, Romana? There isn't any other woman in the universe like you, and I have no intention of resigning myself to some watered-down substitute. You are incomparable. You are the one and only, absolute Romana, and you don't despise me. You're angry with me, and maybe you have cause, but you didn't suddenly stop caring about me because I made a choice you didn't like. I would do it again, because it was what Gallifrey needed, and—you will hate me for saying this—what you needed, too. You couldn't have stopped this war, Romana. If anyone or anything in the universe could have stopped it, it would have been you, but it just wasn't possible. And right now, you are blaming me for it, and that's fine, because otherwise you would have blamed yourself._

 _But you don't get to pretend that politics make any difference to us. A week ago, you were in love with me. It was written all over your mind, right there for me to see every time we made contact. You loved me, and you're too completely stubborn to change your mind on something so important just because I disagreed with you, no matter how important a disagreement or on how grand a scale. You loved me then, and you love me now, and I'm not going to let you forget, or pretend. I can't make you forgive me or force you to take me back. But I won't let you forget that you want to. And when you do decide that you've had enough of lying to yourself, I want you to remember that I'll be here, Romana. I'll be right here, waiting for you. I'm not going to change my mind._

 _I've been dispatched to Arcadia, to the shipyards, defending the planet and designing the vessels that will fight this war. Once a day, a TARDIS carrying paper dispatches flies back to Gallifrey (command seems to think that old-fashioned communication will be more secure), and once a week, it will bring one of my letters home to you. I don't expect you to write back—I know you that well—but I'll watch it every time it returns, anyway, just in case. If nothing else, I can hope that one day I'll annoy you so profoundly that you won't be able to stop yourself writing to me. Whatever else happens, you cannot possibly deny my talent for annoying you._

 _Until next week,  
Narvin_

 

She stares at the paper in disbelief. He can't possibly mean it, she consoles herself. He'll give up after a week or two. He's probably given up already. She'll throw the letter away and forget all about it. And if there are more, she just won't read them. That's all. She hasn't got time to waste on him. She wouldn't waste it on him if she did. He's wrong about her curiosity, and he's wrong about the rest of it, too. It will be terribly easy to ignore him, because she simply doesn't care. All they ever had was a fling, one which she entered into much against her better judgment and allowed to continue long beyond its shelf-life. That it lasted so long was a fluke to begin with—and on the other hand, what's nine years, between Time Lords? Nothing, is what. The blink of an eye. He'll have forgotten her before she knows it. Better yet, _she'll_ have forgotten _him_ , and no amount of unwanted correspondence will remind her. She'll just put the letter in her pocket, out of sight of prying eyes, and when she gets a chance, she'll destroy it.

And if, at the end of the day, she doesn't so much burn the letter as put it away in the isomorphically locked drawer of her bedside table, she's too tired to lecture herself about it any further.


	5. Quintilis (the fifth month)

**Week 1**

 

_Romana,_

_There was a minor skirmish here today. The Sunari snuck in a small force the last time the transduction barriers were raised, hidden in a shipment of supplies. Today they launched simultaneous attacks on the dozen most important outposts on Arcadia, hoping to use them to gain control of the planet. It should be a comfort to you to know that our enemy are such poor tacticians; they stretched themselves far too thin, and I and my men (they've promoted me to Captain, had I told you? As titles go, it's nothing to Coordinator of the CIA, and still less to President of the High Council, but it's something, all the same) had no trouble in finishing off the group that advanced on our bunker. If I had been the one leading the invasion force, I'd have focused on sabotage, not attack, and would, I don't doubt, have caused us a great deal more trouble than the Sunari did. As it was, they were stealthy enough about getting past the outermost fortifications, avoiding the gas mines that dot the outlands and managing to trick any number of sensors of various kinds. The moment they encountered any resistance, however, they launched a wild, disordered attack that we were only too quick to put down. That resistance happened to be myself and some twenty-five of my fellows, and we killed or captured all sixteen of the Sunari at no greater cost than one regeneration and one death on our side. It may not have been much, as fighting goes, but it was a far cry from life in the Citadel._

_Most of the time, we don't even see that much in the way of action. I've spent most of my days recently up to my elbows in gears and wiring: building prototype TARDISes, designing new weapons, improving surveillance systems and spying devices of our own that can best them, and, in particular, building up Arcadia's sadly inadequate defenses. I've been earmarked as something of a specialist in defense, it seems, ever since my experiments with partition fields (of a sort you will well remember) happened to save our necks from an unexpected Nekkistani bombardment a few months ago. This week, I've been mostly up in the turrets, improving the range and perfecting the self-targeting on the guns that protect us from aerial attack._

_Scientists and the technically-minded enjoy a privileged position on this world. If I wanted it, I could make it through the day doing a tenth of the work I did back home, and be lauded and patted on the back instead of resented. But that isn't why I came here, and it isn't going to win us this war. I work in the labs or along the battlements until someone thinks to order me to rest, and then I find a guard roster and spend as many spans as they'll have me in marching up and down, pretending to be ready for anything that might come, and when I'm absolutely too tired to stand I sleep for a little while, and do it all again. Only for a span or two a week do I steal any time for myself—which is to say, for you, and these letters._

_That dedication to duty hasn't earned me any friends here, of course. At no stage of my life has it ever done, so that hardly comes as anything of a surprise. Still, there would be something quaint in the idea of brotherhood in arms, if I were inclined to feel any such thing. This is such an old-fashioned war you've engineered, Romana—and that's a good thing. The timelines wouldn't have survived a week under the kind of strain an all-out temporal war would have put on them. Which isn't to say that there aren't a vast number of things you should still be doing. I know that you're loath to condone genocide, even in war, but allowing our bionengineers the range to develop viral agents to target the races we're fighting against... You needn't ever use them, just the threat would be enough. Or, during my tenure as a field agent at the CIA, there were whispers of attempts to capture and control a colony of Vashta Nerada. I could never find the files, once I became Coordinator, but I suspect they do exist, somewhere. Only think what a weapon that would be, the power to make every one of our enemies afraid of every shadow..._

_But you have other voices around you to talk about tactics and strategy. I imagine it's all anyone talks to you about these days. Your life is as full of war as mine is, and we both deserve a moment to think of other things. I miss the color of your hair, Romanadvoratrelundar. I miss the smell of you. Most mornings still I wake up and roll over expecting to find you within reach, and it does nothing for my temper, always waking up disappointed. I would feel a pitiable idiot, telling you all of this, except that I know you miss me just as much. You do, Romana, I know it's true. You know it, too. Do your part for the war effort, my Lady President. Only a few lines to a poor besotted soldier, out here on the front. You might, for example, lecture me on why I've not managed to win this war for you yet. More hopefully, you might lecture me on the sorry state of the CIA these days, though I suppose you'd manage to make that all my fault despite the fact that I'm no longer there. Best of all, you might lecture me on your own sorry state of tension, and all the things I ought to be doing to relieve it. In fact, if you don't write to me, I intend to take it as an invitation to write that letter myself, next time around. Yes, I think so. If I hear nothing from you before next week, you'll be receiving a letter on every single thing I could do to ease the stresses of your office. I think I'll be looking forward to that._

_Yours, now as ever,  
Narvin_

 

Romana bites her lip, and glances back down at the letter on her desk. It's the eighteenth she's received from Narvin since the beginning of the war, one every week like clockwork, and she has long since mastered her method of replying without actually replying. She picks up her pen, flips over the sheets of paper, and draws a circle in the empty space.

 

_The sorry state of the CIA is all your fault. And I do not miss you._

_The Vashta Nerada idea may not be entirely stupid._

 

"K-9," she calls, and he wheels across her office to meet her. "Access panel unseal," she instructs, and the storage compartment on his side slides open. She folds the letter and slips it back into its envelope; it's addressed straightforwardly, 'To Romana from Narvin,' but the style of the direction is _so_ informal as to be almost an insult in a letter to a President, implying a complete equality between recipient and sender. With a brief glare, she places the envelope inside K-9, and pushes his access panel closed.

"Remind me to put that away this evening, K-9."

"Yes, mistress."

"Update on the war, K-9. What are the major fronts today?"

"There is a major space battle taking place above the planet Therolon, mistress. The primary participants are Gallifreyan and Nekkistani, though the Monans and our Phaidon allies are also involved to a limited extent. As you are aware, the Temporal Alliance has made the capture of Therolon a major priority, because they believe that Gallifrey's most advanced temporal weaponry is produced there..."

"...but on the Doctor's suggestion, the planet was covertly evacuated six weeks ago, and is now manned by androids producing what are little more than papier-mâché guns, while the real weapons manufacture is now conducted inside a hollowed-out planetoid three systems over."

"Affirmative, mistress. However, Chancellor Braxiatel, the Doctor master and Adviser Leela believe that we can only maintain the ruse by defending Therolon as thoroughly as we would if production continued there. Minister Delox concurs."

"I don't much care what Minister Delox thinks, K-9. You know I wouldn't have him as my Minister of War if only everyone else on this planet weren't even more useless."

"Nevertheless, mistress..."

"...he happens to be right in this particular case. Yes, I think so too. Where else, K-9?"

"Gallifreyan bombers have scored several hits on the Sunari homeworld, mistress. As per your instructions, all weaponry used there is temporal, rather than violent. Significant portions of the Sunari capital have now been placed in a state of temporal stasis. However, with the proper technology, rescue teams from other parts of the planet might succeed in entering the affected areas and disabling the stasis devices our battle TARDISes have been dropping. Only once Sunari shielding is breached so completely that the entire planet can be seeded with stasis devices in a single bombing run will we be in a position to negotiate a Sunari surrender."

"It's still a step in the right direction," says Romana. "How are we doing at preventing Temporal Alliance strikes on non-timefaring worlds?"

In what Romana considers a particularly heinous step, the Nekkistani have taken to pointing their guns at worlds populated by sentient life forms not yet sufficiently advanced to defend themselves, knowing that Romana will step in to stop the slaughter of the innocent. She is aware that by responding she is giving the Nekkistani exactly what they want—a division in Gallifreyan troops—and that if she were only willing to let a few primitive planets slide, her enemies would soon lose interest in neutral worlds and leave the rest of the universe be. But she can't permit trillions of intelligent beings to die only for the sake of tactics. Besides, the world the Nekkistani have chosen for their latest showdown is Earth, and the Doctor would never forgive her if she let his pet planet be destroyed before its time. Come to that, she wouldn't forgive herself. On its better days, Earth is one of her favorite planets too.

"The Shadow Proclamation are investigating, mistress, and..."

"The Shadow Proclamation? Those self-important glorified meter maids? What good do they suppose they can do?"

"Unprovoked threats to a class five world..."

"...Are an offense they must be _seen_ to oppose, but which they cannot properly punish, and certainly cannot prevent."

"Affirmative."

"That falls to _us_ , as usual."

"Lamenting the Time Lord's Burden, Romana? I hoped you knew your Earth history better than that."

"The only lamenting Time Lord I recall from Earth's history is _you_ , Doctor," says Romana, watching as he strolls through her door. "What's going on at my CIA?"

"I could tell you," the Doctor deadpans, "but I'd have to kill you."

"You realize even joking about that is an act of high treason."

"My predecessors would be so proud," says the Doctor, wiping away an imaginary tear.

"Knowing the CIA, they probably would," Romana admits. "I really do need a situation report, Doctor."

"Oh, the usual dull sort of thing. The twenty-first attempt to travel back in time to bug the Monan Hostworld was caught by their sensors just as quickly as the previous twenty, but we did manage to nip their research into time corridors in the bud, so that's them out of the time travel business for a little while longer yet. Our 'taking candy from Time Tots' division is doing a _roaring_ business, but I'm managing to see to it that the foreign students technically prisoners here on Gallifrey are still getting a decent education, and not being maltreated. That project to evacuate the more dangerous inhabitants of the Death Zone so it can be used as a stronghold in case of an invasion of the planet is progressing, though I still don't think setting up shop anywhere so near to Rassilon's unhappy influence is a good idea. And on my evening off, I went for a stroll through the rings of Kasterborous and accidentally foiled a really quite decent Sunari invasion plot."

"Of course you did." She hides a smile. "And your advances in CIA training?"

"The Time Lords and Ladies I theoretically command still think every other race in the universe is stupid, but they seem to have expanded their opinions far enough to include to 'stupid _and_ dangerous.' Which isn't actually what I was trying to teach them at all, but with them I have to take any change as a win. One or two of them may even be edging up on the capacity for original thought. Rodan is showing real promise, I knew she would. Not by normal CIA standards, possibly, but by _my_ standards. Practically all of them have learned to run when I tell them to run, and most of the ones that haven't have had a regeneration or two to drum the message through their thick skulls. And Andred hasn't yet told me to stuff it and do my own paperwork, so that's a plus."

"This is a question for the Chancellery Guard as well, but I'm asking you first—do you think your agency can sufficiently guarantee my safety to make a visit to some of the outlying bases a possibility? I think it would do the troops good, to see that their President hasn't forgotten them."

"Ah, Romana, what's the point in living if you can't live dangerously?"

"That's all very well, Doctor, but if I'm captured, the consequences could be catastrophic, for others still more than for me."

"I think it's safe enough," says the Doctor, "if your Castellans don't get themselves into a strop, of course. Where are you planning to go? Gryben, Therolon, Arcadia..."

" _Not_ Arcadia," she says, hurriedly. "But the others...yes. Dortox. Magresia. Some of the space stations and temporal outposts. And I want to inspect the Cruciform, as soon as it's in any state."

"That _isn't_ safe, Romana, and you know I don't say that lightly. I don't want you anywhere near that thing. I don't want _me_ anywhere near that thing. I don't want _anyone_ anywhere near that thing."

"I know you don't approve, Doctor, but it _is_ a last resort."

"I don't like last resorts, Madam President," he says. "They have a terrible habit of being used after all."

"When we get to that point you can talk me out of it," she says. "Until then, it's being built, and that's all there is to say about it."

"It'll backfire," says the Doctor. "It will be more of a danger than it ever is a help, and it..."

"I don't require your input on this matter, Doctor."

"Well that's quite simply too bad, Romana, because I..."

"Doctor," says Romana, loudly enough to be heard, but not shouting, "have you ever found any CIA files about the Vashta Nerada?"

Occasionally, Romana is afraid of the Doctor. Not afraid as a Time Lady—she knows he's the most honorable man she's ever met. But as a President, he frightens her. He's completely uncontrollable and completely unpredictable and completely unstoppable, and that's not a combination any leader can entirely approve of. _Romana_ can depend on him, but the President of the Time Lords never can, and so long as her people are in danger, she knows which one of those she has to be. It's something of a comfort, then, to remember that the Doctor is hardly lacking for weaknesses. He is, for example, extraordinarily distractable.

"...Vashta Nerada?"

"Nanoscopic, deadly and eternally hungry creatures that live in shadow and are shadow?"

"Yes, I know what they are. I've even seen them—well, I've seen their handiwork, anyway. Not so easy to actually see _them_. I didn't think you'd even believe in them, Romana. Most Time Lords don't."

"Apparently, there have been rumors floating around for centuries of a CIA program to study the Vashta Nerada. I need to know whether it's true, and, if so, what results that study produced."

"Can't the Matrix tell you that?"

"The CIA's databanks exist on their own network, and apparently the Vashta Nerada files, if they even exist, are hidden within it. Never mind keeping secrets from Presidents; your Agency is so adept in concealment that it's mastered the art of keeping secrets from _itself_."

"My Agency? _My_ Agency? Romana, you of all Time Ladies know that I am working under duress. It isn't _my_ Agency. I'm...I'm a _prisoner_ , that's what I am."

"Poor thing," clucks Romana. "You are, however, a prisoner with more complete access to the CIA's files than even I've got. It'll be a treasure hunt, and I know you're good at those." She smiles. "Though no magic wand this time to point you in the right direction."

"Has it occurred to you that I may do the same thing to your files that I did to the Key to Time?" he asks. "I've not missed the possible significance of a file on the Vashta Nerada to the war, Romana. Your own personal shadow assassination force?"

"Do you really think one or two assassinations would be uncalled-for, Doctor?"

He stares at her. "Did you honestly just ask me that question, Romana?

"Doctor, if I can stop the destruction of a hundred spacetime ships a day and the snuffing out of all the lives aboard by the simple expedient of killing the High Monan, don't you think that's worth it? Remembering, by the by, that the Monans were the ones who began this war in the first place? I gave everything I had for peace, Doctor, and I'm giving everything I have now to stop this becoming a bloodbath. Do you know how _easily_ I could end this war, if I were willing to abandon all my scruples? If I were willing to risk the damage to the timeline, I could wipe every other timefaring race out of history completely— _I've_ got the Vortex, not them. But I'm trying to prove that we're _not_ ruthless and irresponsible, to make surrender a palatable option for our enemies when they get sick of throwing themselves uselessly against transduction barriers that aren't ever going to budge. And if by removing one extremist leader I open up the possibility of peace, if by one single death I can demonstrate both that Gallifrey's reach is inescapable and that our aims are not indiscriminate, that we can get at anyone we choose but _don't_ choose to kill without a good reason, isn't that a just enough cause for you?"

"Just?" asks the Doctor. "No. No, not just. But comprehensible. That, at least."

"I'm a Time Lady," says Romana. "Not a superbeing. Not even much of a general. I'm one Time Lady, and I'm only doing the best I can. I'm sorry, Doctor, but you can't expect me to win a war without killing anyone. And if I do have to kill, surely it's better to aim for the people who were actually responsible for this war, not the foot soldiers pushed into it by honor or duty or plain necessity. Now find me the files, _please_ , Doctor. I can only fight so many battles at once, and for all I know, this experiment never even existed, or didn't ever work. If you must, you can debate me about it once I've actually got the information in my hand."

"I will, _and_ about the Cruciform, too," he promises, then frowns. "If you've never seen these files, why do you even think they might exist?"

"Presidents have their secrets too, Doctor."

"Ah," he says, smiling. "And is the good former Coordinator well?"

"I wouldn't know," she says, stiffly.

The Doctor grins, spreading wide across his face. "Oh, I always like that."

"Like what?"

"When you're all, like this," he waves a hand at her, a gesture that encompasses the Presidential desk, her robes, her collar, "I'm sometimes afraid you're a politician after all. And then you go and remind me that you can't be."

She arches an eyebrow. "I'm the President of Gallifrey, and not a politician?"

"How could you be," he says, "when you're such a terrible liar?"

"Get out, Doctor," she says, fondly exasperated.

He bows with a tremendous flourish. "Not going to try to convince me that the moon is made of green cheese, Romana?"

" _Out_ , Doctor."

"K-9 will tell me the truth. Won't you, K-9?"

"Aff—"

"Not _one word_ , K-9."

"Enjoy your reading, Romana," grins the Doctor, and disappears out the door.

 

**Week 2**

 

"Oh," she says. "Oh. I see."

"If your Excellency was expecting any important communications..."

"No," she says, quickly. "No, of course not. I'm simply disturbed that our Vortex protections are apparently so ineffectual as to allow a TARDIS in the Vortex to be shot down, that's all."

"There is a brief moment during the transportation process, while capsules are entering or leaving the Vortex, when they exist in real space, Madam President, and are therefore vulnerable to attack. The mail TARDIS from Arcadia that was shot down this morning was in the process of leaving the Vortex at the time."

"Ah," she says. "I see. Yes. Well, if there were any urgent messages, I'm sure they'll be re-sent on the next run. Thank you, Minister Delox."

"My Lady President," he says, bowing his way out of Romana's command center, what was once her outer office. The room is lined with Matrix viewscreens now, at least a hundred of them, covering every bit of wallspace. Each shows a vidfeed of some off-world base or a map of some interstellar battlefield. The main desk that used to dominate this office has been removed; poor Areliane has been shunted off to work at a desk stuck in a corner of one of the dozen offices surrounding this room, but she's still better off than most of Romana's staff. There aren't any engineers to spare for the necessary calculations to dimensionally augment the Presidential Complex right now, and so the greatly increased number of people who are now a part of Romana's immediate staff have been crowding in wherever they can squeeze.

"Were you waiting for something in the mail from Arcadia, Madam President?" asks Leela, looking up from the enormous oval map table in the center of the room with a cheeky grin. Romana is struck, not for the first time, by how quickly Leela has adjusted to the return of her sight. True to her word, Leela only uses the implants when she is on official business. But it's wonderful to be able to look her in the eye again.

"Have you noticed that you only call me 'Madam President' when you're making fun of me, Leela? I think you spent far too much time traveling with the Doctor. His aversion to authority has rubbed off on you."

"I traveled with the Doctor from ten summers after my passing into womanhood, until I had aged so far as you see me now. K-9 can tell you how long exactly, but I do not think it can have been more than five of your years. And how long did _you_ spend with him, Romana?"

Romana coughs. "A while," she says.

"That is not a Time Lord answer."

"No," Romana agrees. "I was putting it in your terms, Leela. I thought it would be friendlier."

"You are so kind to a poor stupid savage," and the grin is back, "Madam President."

"How is the siege of Nekkistan progressing, Adviser Leela?" asks Romana.

"It is good!" Leela says. "Our enemies lie bleeding in their own streets, Romana. It is not long before they will _beg_ us for our mercy."

A Time Lord passing by with his arms full of printed readouts gives Leela a nervous, sidelong glance and scuttles in the opposite direction.

"How _many_ of our enemies lie bleeding, Leela?" asks Romana, skeptically.

"Well...a few," says Leela. "Some of our bombs have fallen through their shields today."

"How many, exactly?"

"Three," Leela admits. "And they were not very big bombs."

"Wonderful," sighs Romana. "It's going to be one of _those_ days."

It does indeed prove to be one of _those_ days. She spends most of it in her office, reviewing domestic policy—life on Gallifrey cannot grind to a halt simply because they happen to be at war. The siege of Nekkistan continues at a pace that would make a snail ashamed, and the High Council meeting that breaks up her afternoon is an exercise in frustration and futility. During her evening security briefing, she finds herself snapping at Brax when he tries to give her a report on weapons production that she asked him for specifically, and nearly kicks Minister Delox when he points out as much.

By first sunset, the entire Citadel seems to have got the message to stay well clear. Romana is left alone with Brax's report, which, while crucial, is far from an engaging read. She finds herself making increasingly frequent and abrupt calls for updates on the Nekkistani situation, and by the fifth time the same nervous young Under-Cardinal has to inform her that no progress has been made, he's so obviously terrified that she can't help snapping at him to grow a backbone and stop sniveling. After that, she's too ashamed to inflict herself on anyone else, and is left sulking in her office, with no outlet for her temper but her own black thoughts.

The moons have grown bright outside her window by the time her door slides open, and K-9's Mark I and II roll in side by side. Each K-9 has a small pile of envelopes balanced on his back.

"Surely there are better uses for your brain than delivering letters, K-9," says Romana. "And were both of you really necessary?"

"None of the organic beings in the Citadel felt that approaching you today would be salubrious to their health, Madam President," says K-9 Mark I.

"And there is safety in numbers, mistress," puts in K-9 Mark II.

"Oh, _very_ amusing," she grumbles. "Leave the dispatches and go, then, if you're so reluctant to be near me."

"Apologies, mistress Romana, but we cannot 'leave the dispatches,'" K-9 Mark I points out.

"Speak for yourself," says K-9 Mark II, imperiously. "My programming is equipped to obey the mistress's instruction." K-9 suddenly begins to shake rapidly, sending envelopes flying in all directions.

"Why in the Seven Systems would the Doctor ever think _that_ was a useful feature?" asks Romana, intrigued in spite of herself.

"He added it after the incident at Brighton Beach, mistress," says K-9. "The Doctor master said that this was how genus _canidae_ addressed the phenomenon of excess moisture."

"That sounds like his sense of humor," she admits.

"Of course, the _inferior_ K-9 unit..."

K-9 Mark I makes a noise very much like a disgruntled sniff. "Such additional features are not necessary," he says. Before Romana or K-9 Mark II can react, K-9 Mark I has wheeled himself to the corner of her very sturdy desk, and proceeded to ram himself repeatedly against one of its legs, a few more envelopes sliding off with each impact until all of them lie on the floor to either side.

K-9 Mark II wheels hurriedly over. "That was an illogical maneuver," he says, with something almost like concern. "Your casing is damaged."

"A minor dent," dismisses K-9 Mark I. "In organic parlance, 'only a scratch.'"

"You should see Cardinal Braxiatel for repairs," says K-9 Mark II, still in the same very nearly empathetic tone. "If your circuits were impacted..."

"Oh, for heaven's sake," Romana says, annoyed at her own annoyance, "take the flirting somewhere else, the pair of you."

Both K-9's wheel on her with what appear, to her own guilty conscience, to be a pair of reproachful stares. "We are going, mistress," says K-9 Mark II, somewhat haughtily, she thinks, and they wheel in the direction of the door.

Sighing, Romana kneels and begins to collect the envelopes scattered across her floor. One catches her eye, and she finds herself calling, "K-9!"

"Mistress?" says K-9, from her doorway.

"I thought the TARDIS from Arcadia was shot down this morning."

"Affirmative, mistress. A second shipment was scheduled this evening so urgent communications would not be delayed."

"Oh," she says. "Oh. I...well. Thank you, K-9. You may go."

"Mistress," says K-9, in a pleasantly surprised tone, and wheels out the door.

The nature of Gallifreyan is such that even a simple direction can easily be coded with a great deal of information. On the surface, what the envelope says is _From Captain Narvindrasterienableth to the Lady President Romanadvoratrelundar_ , but the titles are phrased in such a way as to include a pair of locations: _From Captain Narvindrasterienableth, lost in the darkness, to the Lady Romanadvoratrelundar, forever in the light_. She tries to roll her eyes at it, and doesn't succeed as completely as she would like. She does manage not to be too eager about returning to her desk, slitting the envelope open, and pulling out the sheets inside.

 

_My Romana,_

_I may have overestimated my own abilities, I'm afraid. I did try my hand at the sort of letter that I implied I was intending to, and never has a page loomed so blank. I stared at it, and stared at it, and then I was waking up the next morning with a sheet of paper pressed to my face, without having written a word. From what I hear, however, my tardiness proved providential, as if I had managed to write anything on time, it would have been blasted to atoms. How did the Monans manage to target a TARDIS inside the Vortex? And have you been pursuing the research into Vortex barriers that that imbecilic but possibly inspired young researcher from the Academy kept trying to get CIA funding for all through my tenure? I finally gave it to him about two months before the beginning of the war, and I'd double it now if I could. The Vortisaurs won't keep them out forever._

_But back to more important things: you, and me, and these letters. My failure as an author of prurient prose stemmed not, I think you should know, from lack of imagination, but because I don't find basic decency to be so easy to set aside as I had hoped. To do the kinds of things I would like to do to you, that's one thing; getting caught up in the moment, when you're there with me and caught up yourself, that's all very well. To write about them is something quite different. I have no use for alcohol generally speaking, but I think the solution will be for me to get just a little drunk, and then I suspect I'll be able to stop feeling an arse for long enough to get something onto a page. For the moment, however, I would like to suggest that you recall the third night of our fifth stay on Davidia. You know precisely what I mean. That particular memory has been very frequently revisited on my side, and I think it only fair that you should do some reminiscing of your own._

_While we're on the subject of reminiscences, do you even remember the first time we met? It would have been far more important to me than to you—it's not every day a Time Lord is introduced to his President—but I think the occasion of choosing a new Coordinator may have been significant enough to stick in your mind as well. I was nervous, of course I was, and trying desperately not to show it, and the first thing you said to me when the door closed, the first sentence you ever spoke to me was, 'I think you should know first off that I don't like you, Narvin, and I'm never going to.' You can imagine how I felt, Romana. Do you recall what you told me? You said that you had liked and even trusted your last Coordinator, and that it had been a mistake. You said that it had been dangerous, and that it had blinded you to things you should have seen. You said that Gallifrey couldn't afford for its President and its CIA Coordinator to get along._

_'I didn't select you for this post because you're the absolute best man for the job, Head Technician Narvin,' you said. 'I wouldn't have chosen you if your peers hadn't said you were intelligent and would probably do the job competently most of the time, and I appreciated the fact that your personality profile suggested you're at least as honest and loyal as the average spook in CIA robes. But there were a dozen other CIA Time Lords and Ladies of whom as much could have been said, and you had one thing they lacked: your co-workers all agreed that you are one of the least likable Time Lords in the entire Agency, and that's exactly what I wanted. I think you deserve to know in advance that you shouldn't expect me to treat you as though I like you, because I don't. I'm going to be difficult to please and thankless even when you manage it, and I'm certainly not going to treat you like a friend. You should know that before you make your decision. But I'm offering you the highest office in your entire Agency, and so long as I let you keep it, you'll know it's because I think you're doing the job well.'_

_Possibly it should all have given me pause. Possibly I should have hesitated. The thought didn't even occur to me. If I'd spent my life trying to be a liked man instead of a competent one, I'd have been bitter and broken by my second century. You'll understand that, Romana; you're just the same yourself. But not needing to be liked is a different thing from being unhappy with it when it happens. And years after that first meeting, at night, when I couldn't sleep, and you were curled up next to me, and I had my arm around you, I used to remember that the first thing you said to me was that you weren't ever going to like me, and that here you were, and if I liked, I could have kissed you awake. And now I fall asleep thinking that someday, I'll have my arm around you again in the night, and think to myself that once, you told me you would never let me touch you again, and I will kiss you awake, then, because now I know that where you are concerned, I can't allow any chance to pass by. You're far too important for that._

_Write to me, Romana. Tell me what you're thinking. And I, meanwhile, will go about conning a canteen of something caustic off of some poor private, the better to erode my inhibitions. Next week, maybe I'll succeed in writing something I can be well and truly mortified about later, something you can mock me for until we're both old and grey. I think we'd both like that, don't you?_

_Entirely yours,  
Narvin_

 

It isn't romantic. It isn't. Not even a little. It can't possibly be, because it's _Narvin_. Cynical, sneering, sarcastic Narvin, paranoid and pessimistic, conservative and cold, neither handsome nor charming and _definitely_ not suave. She may, occasionally, at moments, have had reason to suppose that he might possibly be a good man (which can't be true, can it, because good men don't start wars), but she was never under any illusions about him being a nice one. Then again, she's not entirely what the average person might call a nice woman herself. And she may have told him more than once and in no uncertain terms that romance was not a trait she would tolerate from him. The idea that he might have _been_ a romantic all along is...horrifying? Surely, it must be horrifying. It must.

She considers, for example, that night on Davidia, the one he's just drawn to her mind. Under the mutual influence of too much champagne and the unexpected intoxicant of their once-yearly week of actual honest-to-Rassilon leisure, he had persuaded her to let him take his time with her. He must have spent a solid span in kissing his way over her body—the curve of her hips, the hollows of her ankles, the tiny bones of her wrists, the swell of her breasts, the backs of her knees, the pads of her fingertips, the smooth skin of her thighs, every single nanometer of her back, before pulling her into the curve of his body, spooned like shadow nestled against sunlight. He had fucked her slowly, unable to take her very deeply at that angle but stretching her in all the right ways, and her skin had still been humming from those hundreds and hundreds of kisses. She's not entirely sure she hadn't whimpered a bit when he tangled his hand in the strands of her hair, with his arm pressed across her chest, holding her close to him. Their minds had been drifting and flowing through each other, and he'd kissed her neck as she came, his teeth scraping just enough to remind her that she was alive, and it had been...

 _Awful_ , she tells herself, firmly. As she has now made patently clear to herself through that remarkably detailed bit of recollection, it had _obviously_ been awful. And absurd. Farcical. Ridiculous. Of course it had. Because the very idea of the kind of sex that the soppily minded would probably call 'lovemaking' is enough to make her roll her eyes, and the thought of having that kind of sex with _Narvin_ reaches an entirely new plane of absurdity beyond any sort of nonsense she's ever before attempted to ponder. It is a simple and irrefutable fact that Narvin is incapable of being romantic, and therefore these things he's writing her are not love letters. And therefore any increase in her heartrates that she might perceive while reading them is entirely imaginary.

 

_You're forgetting the part where you told me that disliking you was perfectly fine, because you'd never thought much of me either, and hadn't voted for me, and didn't expect that working with me was likely to change your mind. The first time you kissed me, it was all I could think about. Or practically all._

 

She's written the words in the margin of his page before she can stop herself. With an angry glance at her own pen hand, she manages to conclude her annotation slightly more satisfactorily with, _Don't be so confusing, Narvin, you give me headaches._

"The mail came from Arcadia after all," says a voice from the other side of her office, and Romana nearly jumps out of her skin.

"And why would you suppose that this is from Arcadia?"

"Because your pupils are di...dili...ditil... Your eyes are very black. And you did not shout at me the moment I walked through the door. And you are blushing. And your scent is..."

"Yes, all right, well done, Leela, it's from Arcadia. And I am _not_ blushing."

"Why do you not call him home? He belongs here, Romana."

"He made his choice," says Romana, looking away from the letter with a frown. "And I have more important things to think about."

"If you do, I cannot see them," says Leela. "This is a very _slow_ war, Romana. When will something _happen_?"

"This seems to have become something of a siege war. That's bad from your perspective, Leela, as it means relatively little in the way of hands-on fighting, but good from mine, because it's a definite Gallifreyan advantage. All the major worlds involved in this conflict are heavily shielded, and while there may be actual ground fighting on a small scale on colony planets where that shielding is weaker, the war won't become real to the citizens of any of the powers involved until someone's homeworld is seriously threatened. Of course, the navies have been busy, as we all send ships on missions to attempt to weaken our enemies' walls and fight our way in, and alternately defend our own borders. But everyone involved knows that Gallifrey's transduction barriers are the most formidable shielding in the universe. If nothing else changes, we're practically guaranteed a victory."

"That is boring," says Leela, sullenly. "You promised me battles."

Romana can't help but laugh. "You'll get them, I don't doubt," she says. "For now, we're all alive, and the web of time isn't crumbling around our ears. Enjoy it while you can, Leela."

"And are you enjoying it?"

"No," Romana admits. "But then, I'm an irascible old Time Lady."

"You are not _old_ , Romana."

"I am compared to you, Leela," she says, with a sad little smile, "and this war makes me feel it."

Leela studies her, and Romana thinks again how strange and how good it is, to be able to look Leela in the eye. "You are coming with me," Leela decides, and stretches out her hands to pull Romana from her chair.

"Where are we going?" Romana asks.

"You are coming for dinner with me and Andred," Leela pronounces. "And we will invite the Doctor and Braxiatel, too."

"But..."

"No," says Leela, firmly. "You are right, Romana. We are all alive and safe. We should celebrate good things while we have them. And you must remember that you are not only a President. You are a person, too, with friends who hold you dear."

Romana considers pleading her unfinished report. Her mouth opens to make the excuse, and then it closes again. "Thank you, Leela," she says instead, surprised by how genuinely touched she sounds.

Leela smiles. "Come," she says, tugging Romana towards the door.

"I'll be there in just a moment, Leela, I promise," she says.

Leela nods, and is gone. Romana turns back to her desk, moves all the official documents she's been reading into a drawer, and, pressing her thumb against the access panel, engages the psychic lock. The only paper left on her desk is decidedly _not_ official, and she gives it one more long, considering glance. Then she refolds the sheets and slips them back into their envelope.

"Romana!" sounds Leela's voice over the intercom.

"Coming, Leela!" Romana calls.

The pocket that she slips Narvin's letter into on the way out the door happens to be the one nearest to her hearts, but she's certain it isn't a coincidence worth examining.

 

**Week 3**

 

 _To Romanadvoratrelundar from Narvindrasterienableth_ , says the envelope, _and not for any reason to be opened in the presence of another living soul. Or non-living, unless you'd care to do a lot of explaining to that tin box you call a dog._

"What does Captain Narvin think you have to explain, mistress?"

"Never mind, K-9."

K-9 makes the whirring sound she has always associated—irrationally, she knows—with deep thought. "It seems probable that the Captain underestimates the limits of my databanks, mistress. I can state with 97.6% certainty that the contents of that letter..."

"I know what the contents of that letter are, K-9."

"My databanks hold examples of similar pieces of correspondence sent home by soldiers from many races and time periods, but this is the first sample I have encountered written by a Time Lord in the present conflict. If for academic and historical purposes, I might be permitted to..."

"No, K-9, you may not."

"But mistress..."

"No, K-9."

"But..."

" _No_ , K-9. Bad dog," she says, severely.

K-9 hangs his head, his tail drooping. She studied an enormous amount of psychology in her time at the Academy, and doesn't a bit like what it says about her, but she knows that she will always have an inordinately strong sympathetic reaction to the suffering of animals compared to intelligent beings. Then again, K-9 isn't actually an animal, and is just as intelligent as most of the Time Lords she knows, so perhaps that's all right, then. Bending down, she scoops him up into her lap, and cranes her neck to look him in the (figurative) eye.

"I'm sorry for snapping, K-9, but you know perfectly well the sorts of societal taboos at play in this context. Erotic correspondence between lovers is meant to be private, at least in Gallifreyan culture. Intellectual curiosity is all very well, but one _can_ carry it to the point of vulgarity."

"Query, mistress?"

"Yes, K-9?"

"Is 'lover' the proper designation for yourself and Captain Narvin at present, mistress?"

Romana opens her mouth, and then closes it again. "No," she says. "No, of course it isn't."

"What is?"

She purses her lips, and sets K-9 back on the ground. "That's quite enough questions for today, K-9," she says, primly. "Tell me about today's schedule."

"Morning briefing from Chancellor Braxiatel, eight bells. Meeting with Chapter Castellans to discuss recruitment and training, nine bells. Ten bells to midday, allocated for review of planetary budgets for the upcoming fiscal season. Lunch meeting with Under-Coordinator Andred, midday, no agenda listed."

"He and I both know it's so he can assure me the Doctor is actually running my intelligence agency, and not quietly dismantling it behind my back," says Romana, "but it's best if the official record never reflects that fact. If he brings Leela along, it'll look like nothing more than a social occasion. Go on, K-9, what else?"

"Council meeting, two bells. Likely subjects of debate include proposed changes of curriculum at the Academy to better prepare older students to contribute to the war effort after their graduation. Appointment with Press Secretary Prandick, five bells, in preparation for your press conference at six bells. Call to the Princess of Yevnon, seven bells, to encourage continued Yevnon neutrality in the current conflict. Dinner meeting on Phaidon with the Prime Minister of the Warpsmiths, eight bells; Presidential TARDIS ready and standing by. Appointment with Minister Delox to discuss relative strengths and weaknesses of the Gallifreyan navy and methods by which our TARDIS fleet can be strengthened, eleven bells."

"Is that all, K-9?"

"At the moment, mistress."

"Remind me again why I ever came back from E-Space."

"You wanted to prove that you could, mistress. And you objected to the odor of wet Tharil."

"They might have told me in advance how much it rained on their planet," she grumbles. "And why did I ever take this job?"

"In your own words, mistress, 'I suppose it won't be boring.'"

"Poor naive girl that I was," she sighs. "I'd never been to a High Council meeting before."

Her intercom buzzes. "Madam President?"

"Come in, Brax," she calls. "Let's get this day over with, shall we?"

Sixteen spans later she's dragging herself exhausted to her bed, a line of discarded ceremonial garments trailing from the door of her private quarters all the way to her bedroom. When her robes fall away, there's a strange crunching sound, and she's just conscious enough to remember why. She stops long enough to retrieve the still unread letter from the pocket of her robes, and carries it with her as she seeks out a nightgown, tugs a brush through her hair, and slides into bed.

She oughtn't to bother with reading it tonight. Even if all goes to schedule she'll need to be awake early, and that's without the possibility that some major battle may call her from her bed in the night, some new crisis disturb her rest. She's had only a few spans the past few nights as it is. Before she can even finish lecturing herself about it, however, the envelope is open, the letter in her hand.

 

_Rassilon, Romana, do you know how much I need you?_

_I can't stop thinking of you, this week. I never can, but usually I can keep your clothes on inside my own mind. Not recently. It's been so long, and I can't get you out of my head. Skip the rest of this letter, if this isn't what you want. I won't force myself on you, even in words. Put the paper down, if you don't want to hear this. But I can't help wanting you, Romana._

_If I were home, if you would let me, if you're ready to stop being angry and admit that you've missed me, I would drag you back to your rooms. I would press you back against the door as soon as it closed, and drop to my knees, and shove up your robes. Have I ever told you how much I love the taste of you, how I get off on the way you whimper at the feeling of my mouth? I want to flick my tongue over your clitoris, over and over, while you press your hands into my hair, and dig your fingernails into my scalp when I hit just the right spot, and squirm when you just can't stay still. I want to tease you until your skin is hot under my hands, until you wriggle and plead and your pleasure crests and sweeps up from your toes and you throw back your head with the sensation of it. And then I would stand up, and lift your legs around my waist, and touch my head to yours. I would press into you, physically and mentally both, and fuck you while you were coming, your body clenching and tightening around me, your pleasure flooding into my head. I can't imagine it would be long before you pulled me along with you. Or maybe it would—maybe before I could come, I would find myself carrying you over to the sofa, because you'd be piloting my legs from inside my head. I would lie down on my back, with you on top of me, and you would pin me down by the shoulders, and ride me until I couldn't think, couldn't breathe, until I lost track of anything in the universe but you. You would watch all that happen in my head, and let me go half-crazy before you let me have any release—just the way I'm going half-crazy for you now._

_There are so many things I want to do to you, Romana. I want to do everything to you. I told you as much our first night together, nine and a half years ago now, and I've never stopped wanting it. I've never stopped wanting you, Romana, and I never will. I want to taste your neck. I want to kiss your breasts. I want to watch you undress. I want to bite your hips. I want to hear the way you moan when you're so close you can't keep quiet. I miss your ankles and your mouth and your elbows and the base of your spine, and your hands, Romana, do you know how much I love your hands? I want to suck on every finger, I want to bite your wrists, I want to feel your hands all over my body and watch them run all over yours. Tell me you're touching yourself while you read this, Romana, oh, Rassilon, tell me you..._

 

"Of course I am, damn you," she gasps aloud, the paper falling out of her hand as her eyes squeeze shut. "Damn it, Narvin, I told you not to touch me. It doesn't matter that they're my hands, not yours. This is your fault, it's all your fault, I didn't... I want... I need... I..."

It's the best orgasm she's had in six months, searing pleasure all the way from her toes to her scalp and everywhere in-between, her entire body arching off the bed with the force of it. It's the best orgasm she's had since he went away and left her.

She almost calls him that night. She's the President of Gallifrey; she could get in contact with him whenever she likes. Come to that, she could order him here right now. She could summon him through time and space, and he'd have to come to her, because she's his President. He'd _want_ to come to her; his letters have made that perfectly clear. All it would take would be a few words in the right ears, and she could have him here within five microspans. With a little more wrangling, she could have him here five microspans _ago_. For that matter, he needn't come to Gallifrey at all, she thinks. If she slipped on the Coronet of Rassilon, she could link their two minds through the Matrix, perfect psychic contact even half a universe away, and the things he could do to her, and she to him, even without physical touch, would be...

But she can't let herself do that. Can she? She turned him away for a reason, after all, and it was a good reason, and she hasn't stopped thinking so. She still hates the fact that he pushed her world into this conflict without her say-so, and she knows that he isn't even sorry for it. Granted, she has come to understand that some of what he said then was truer than she had known or wanted to accept. From what she's learned of the Monan, Nekkistani and Sunari preparations, the stockpiles of weapons and the fleets of armed timeships sitting conveniently in reserve, she now thinks that Narvin may have been right, and that nothing could possibly have dissuaded the other temporal powers from war. And she knew even at the time that one of Narvin's major motives in touching off that conflict had been a misguided attempt to protect her. While she couldn't approve of that, she couldn't hate him for it, either.

But there remains the fact that he went behind her back. How can she be expected to trust him, after that? It was hardly the first time they had disagreed on matters political, and that was all right. It wasn't even the first time he'd acted against her politically, and that was all right, too. He's his own man; she doesn't expect him to agree with her every time. But she does expect him to have the decency to give her a chance to fight back. She expects him to give her the benefit of the doubt, and defend her judgment when she isn't around to do it herself.

The idea that perhaps he _did_ try to talk to her and she simply never gave him a hearing... No. She's looking for excuses to forgive Narvin's bad behavior, because it's late at night, and her skin is still humming with post-orgasmic oversensitivity, and she grew used to having him around, and isn't used yet to being alone again. But there aren't any excuses. Her pride would never forgive her if she made the first advance, extended the olive branch in his direction. Not that it would _be_ the first advance, when all this time, he's been sending her letters. These infuriating, presumptuous, distracting, _wonderful_ letters.

She's fairly certain that getting off while reading a letter from her ex hasn't done anything much to support the argument that she doesn't want him back.

Scowling, she reaches down and picks up the letter that has drifted to the floor. Her eyes are drawn to the final paragraph.

 

_Either you are very pleased with me right now, or furious. If I had to guess, I'd say some of both, and that's as near to a win as I've ever been able to expect where you're concerned. I may be too far away to kiss you goodnight, and maybe you wouldn't let me even if I was standing right next to you. But now I can be certain you're thinking of it, just as much as I am, and that's something, Romana. If what I'm reduced to living on these days is no more than the knowledge that I'm still in your head, it's enough. For now, it's got to be enough._

_Rassilon help the man who falls in love with you, Romanadvoratrelundar._

_Narvin_

 

"Rassilon help us both," she sighs. Shoving the letter into the drawer of her bedside table, she turns out her light, and burrows beneath her covers for another long and lonely night.

 

**Week 4**

 

Her schedule has _not_ grown to revolve around the weekly arrival of a certain piece of correspondence, Romana insists to herself. She's a wartime President with a million things to do, and her life is packed to the brim as it is. There are barely enough spans in a day for her to manage a subsistence level of sleep (though these days, she does at least make sure she gets _that_ much). It's absurd to imagine that the defining event of her weeks has become the reading of a few handwritten pages from a man who is now no more than a captain in her army, and who apparently still adores her in despite of the fact that she can distinctly recall sending him packing.

She doesn't care a fig for Narvin _or_ his letters. Her current inability to sleep, despite the facts that it's well past midnight and she's well beyond exhausted, has nothing whatever to do with the mail TARDIS from Arcadia being delayed. She isn't remotely brooding on the fact the letter she'd expected all day will have to wait until tomorrow.

Sighing, Romana switches her light back on, swings her feet off the bed, and heads in the direction of her closet. If she can't sleep, she may as well work. It's better than tossing and turning all night, anyway.

She hardly thinks it's unreasonable to expect to find her own office waiting empty for her, especially at this time of the night. It's a considerable shock, then, when Braxiatel stands from the sofa at the sound of the opening door. She's suddenly very glad she bothered to change out of her pajamas and into a proper set of robes.

"Brax," she says in surprise. "What are you doing here?"

"My apologies, Madam President," he says, laying aside his stack of reports with a deferential little bow. "My offices have been colonized by the team monitoring progress on the Orion front, and I assumed that at this span of the night... Clearly I was mistaken. Forgive my presumption, Romana, I'll just be going..."

"Sit down, Brax," she sighs. "I don't mind company if you don't. Everyone else in the Citadel is packed six to an office these days, and I've got more than space enough to share."

"Thank you, my Lady."

"What are you doing working so late, Braxiatel? Even you've got to sleep sometime."

"Not tonight, I'm afraid. There's been a misunderstanding in requisitions. A fairly minor business, all things considered, but if I don't get this cleared up by morning, there will be a dozen companies going without their breakfasts—and any other meals, until this is all worked out. What's that charming Earth saying?"

"'An army marches on its stomach?'" Romana supplies.

"That's the one."

"Surely we have a quartermaster general somewhere to manage that sort of thing."

"We did until this afternoon. Her TARDIS was gunned down by the Monans about twelve spans ago."

"Wonderful," Romana groans, shifting Brax's pile of reports so she can sit down beside him. "Are we looking into a replacement?"

"A clear chain of command exists already, Madam President, and the new quartermaster general seems to be settling in well enough. But I suspected that a few things would slip through the cracks in the transition, looked into it, and sure enough..."

"You're a marvel, Brax." She rubs her eyes with a yawn.

"Might I inquire what _you_ are doing awake at this time of night, my Lady?"

"Couldn't sleep. I haven't slept well since...since the war started."

"Understandably enough," he says, softly.

"Maybe, but I've hardly got time enough to lie around staring at the ceiling. Not these days."

"Am I keeping you from your own work? I'll just get back to..."

"Please don't. It's so nice to have a real conversation." She stops. "I mean—if _you_ have to..."

He smiles. "I can always spare a few microspans for my President."

"You always have. I do appreciate it, you know." She quirks her head, suddenly serious, studying him. "Why do you do all this, Brax?"

"I'm not certain I know what you mean."

"Any of this. _All_ of this. You work harder than anyone, even me. You've always done so much for me and for Gallifrey, but I've never once seen you take a day off, take the credit, take power, take anything at all for yourself, not without a reason. What do you _want_ , Braxiatel?"

"I admit I've been known to plot the odd scheme in the past, Madam President, but if you suppose I have time these days for..."

"I didn't mean it as an accusation, Brax. I know where your loyalties lie. I'm just curious. No one works as hard as you do without a reason, and every sentient being in the universe wants _something_. With your brain, I can't imagine there's anything at all you couldn't get, if you wanted it."

Brax is absolutely still. His eyes have gone hooded, and they aren't looking at her. "Then you'll forgive me mentioning it, Romana," he says, quietly, "but you have less imagination than I had supposed."

She frowns slightly. "I don't..."

She stops, and blinks several times, very quickly, and the color drains out of her face.

She could be wrong. She could be, but she isn't. She knows she isn't, because he still won't look at her—and then he does, and even though his face is set, expressionless, she knows even better then.

Neither of them says anything. She's breathing faster than she should be, through parted lips, and he's not moving a bit, just watching her.

For once in her lives, she doesn't know what she wants. Mostly, she wants never to have realized what she's just figured out. Every single thing Brax has ever done for her suddenly feels like a burden, an insurmountable debt to be repaid, and she has a moment of terrible petulance just thinking about it. She had believed she was old enough to realize that everything in the universe comes at a price, but he was the one thing she thought she'd got for free, or because she was _good_ somehow, or perhaps, more cynically, for the cost of turning her back on what she ought to have seen a long time ago. And now she's stricken by the desire to tell him to take everything back, that she'd never meant to sell him so much of herself—doubly awful, because she knows he'd never think of it like that. She knows he hasn't been expecting to _earn_ her somehow, but it feels that way, and she's not sure what to do.

She's bone tired. Narvin is very far away, and he doesn't matter anyway, or she won't admit to herself that he does, and that _must_ be the same thing in the long run. And Brax has always been good to her. Brax wants her, and it would be so very nice to be wanted right now. And maybe she'd make him happy, and maybe making someone happy would be enough, for now, when the whole world is so dark. It would be so nice to be held. It would be so good to forget, just for a little while. It would be a comfort, to do something kind.

She's done much worse things in her lives than sleeping with a man who's in love with her, whether or not she could ever love him back.

Romana closes her mouth, and raises her hand, and reaches out for Brax. But before she can touch him, he catches her by the wrist, and holds her still.

"You may ask me for absolutely anything, Romanadvoratrelundar, and you shall have it," he says, very slowly, very deliberately, "but if you care for me at all, don't ask me for this."

"But...I thought..."

"Don't imagine it gives me any pleasure to say it," he says, his lips tight, "but you wouldn't be thinking of me."

Some part of her wants to deny it. She's got a strong contrary streak, and it wants her to kiss him, hard and hot, prove him wrong through force of sheer brute stubbornness. Except, he's right. She knows he's right. And a desire to prove him wrong is hardly reason enough to disrespect a friend, to play havoc with his emotions for the sake of an unconvincing lie.

"I'm sorry, Brax," she says, softly.

He smiles a small, pained smile, and looks back at her. "I know you are," he says, and Rassilon, it would be so _easy_ just to kiss him now, just to let him take her to bed. She knows exactly what it would be like: how worshipful his touch would be, how gently he would use her, how his eyes would grow bright and then dark as he watched her. And she knows she'd wake up in the morning sick with herself, and knows he'd see it the moment he looked at her, and knows how it would kill him. Brax loves her for her strengths, and that says only good things about him, but Romana knows her strengths well enough without anyone else to tell her. She needs someone to love her for her weaknesses, if she's ever to learn how to live with her own faults, and that is the one and only thing that Brax could never give her.

It makes her sorry for them both, but there isn't anything to be done about it. She's got to hurt him sometime, somehow, but it will be so much worse for him if she waits. She owes it to him to be as gentle as she can. That much, at least, she can do.

She stands, and he releases her wrist as she does. "I'll let you get back to work," she says. "Forgive me for...for interrupting your evening."

"Don't be ridiculous, my Lady." He stands in turn. "This is your office, I'll..."

The door slides suddenly open, and both of them snap to look. A startled-looking clerk stands in the doorway, his arms full of paper and datapads.

"Beg pardon, Madam President, Chancellor," he says, clearly mortified. "I only came to deliver the President's messages, for the morning. I ought to have knocked, forgive me, Madam President, only, there isn't usually anyone here, this time of night..."

"That's quite all right. Just leave them on the desk, please, if you would."

"Yes ma'am."

In his hurry to reach the desk, the clerk—Romana feels terribly elitist for not knowing his name, but really, she can't help having very little contact with the night staff—permits an envelope to flutter from the top of his pile. Brax catches it in midair, gracefully, between two fingers, and glances down at it. His breath huffs through his nose for a moment, a bitter little parody of a laugh, before he hands it to her. She already knows who it must be from.

 _To the Lady President Romanadvoratrelundar, from Captain Narvindrasterienableth_ , spells out the swirling calligraphy. It would be entirely formal and proper, except that this time, he's fiddled the tenses that indicate the distance and time that have passed between recipient and sender. In any other language but Gallifreyan, it would say _To Romana, who is always with me_.

She fights desperately against her reddening cheeks, but it only makes her blush more deeply. "Good night, Madam President," says Brax, bowing. In one fluid movement, he collects his stack of reports from the sofa, and, before she can think of anything to say, he's gone, just behind the clerk who has already slipped out the door.

She stands for a moment, staring at the envelope in her hand. Then she flings it violently to the ground and stomps on it, several times, grinding it under her heel. Gritting her teeth, she stalks over to her desk, pulls out a piece of paper, and begins to write.

 _To Captain Narvindrasterienableth from the Lady President Romanadvoratrelundar_ , she addresses, in the most cold and distant tense in their entire tongue, and adds every single one of her considerable list of titles.

 

 _You will stop writing to me, Narvin. I order you to stop writing to me. I was fairly certain that I made all this clear when last we spoke, but as I seem not to have been understood, I will repeat myself, in the most unambiguous possible terms: I do not want to hear from you. I do not want to see you ever, ever again. I do not want to think about you. I certainly do not wish to be reminded of anything that may have passed between us in the past. I hope you shrivel up and rot, because I hate you. I hate you, Narvin, I despise you, and if you were here right now, and I was saying all of this out loud, you would stop me mid-sentence. You would kiss me, and kiss me, and strip off my clothes, and drag me off to bed. And I would let you, because it would be precisely what I wanted, just as much as you did, and it would be good, it would be better than anything, but you can't because you're not here. I didn't give you permission to leave, Narvin, you should be here, because this is where you belong, and because I can't forgive you all the way out there. I can't forgive you with words, but I could with my body, if you were only here. I want you, Narvin, and I miss you, and I hate you, and why did you have to go so bloody fucking far away_...

 

She tears up the note mid-sentence, into mockingly un-festive confetti fragments, and then carefully collects them, and deposits every last one in the incinerator chute beside her desk. For the space of three long breaths she sits quietly at her desk, staring at her hands. And then she stands, and turns in the direction of her own rooms.

Narvin's letter is still sitting on the ground, the envelope scuffed and wrinkled but fundamentally undamaged. She gives it a withering glare, but her hands are gentle when she picks it up. She carries it carefully with her as she heads back to her own bed, hoping for at least a span or two of sleep before first sunrise. But before she turns out her light, she opens the envelope, and pulls out the sheet of paper within.

 

_My own Romana,_

_Yes, it has occurred to me that I am making a fool of myself with these letters. I don't mind that. We're all fools from time to time, and the trick is learning to be a fool for the right reasons. I'd do far worse than that for your sake, Romana, or far better. There isn't anything at all I wouldn't do for you._

_That doesn't mean I'll always do what you tell me to, or even what you ask me to. I care too much about Gallifrey's safety and yours to completely abandon my own judgement. And could you really respect me if I did? I know perfectly well that you've never wanted a man you could wrap around your little finger, and I think you'll agree that I've never been that. I don't follow you blindly, and I never have._

_But I am yours, my Lady. You know I mean that—you've seen it in my mind a thousand times. You know that no other Time Lady has ever been what you are to me, and that I cannot imagine ever finding myself so ridiculously addled over anyone else. Most days I can't imagine how I feel so much even for you. Emotion has never been a particular strong suit of mine, but that hasn't ever seemed to matter where you are concerned. You make me work harder and think more deeply and believe more completely than I ever suspected I was able. I think I've spent my life since I met you striving to become a man who could deserve you, and if that sounds like a complaint, it's precisely the opposite. Thank you for that, Romana. Thank you for giving me someone to fight to be._

_I would write more, but I am falling asleep with my pen in my hand as it is. The Monans have been methodically bombarding our transduction barriers here all week, hoping to find a weak spot (as you probably know already), and we here have been on our toes for days. No matter how much of my time is spent in repairing power generators or manning turret guns, there are still spans enough in the day to miss you. I'm certain you are even more rushed off your feet. I know you won't write to me, but I would give a good deal just to know that you are sleeping at nights. You probably aren't. I would ask you to take care of yourself for me, but then you'd only do the opposite. So take care of yourself to spite me, and see how that works out instead._

_Is it ridiculous to admit that I have dreams about you scowling at me and wake up smiling?_

_Narvin_

 

She bites her lip, and swallows hard, and reads through the letter again. Then she pulls a pad of paper from her bedside table, and writes a single sentence.

 

_I'm certainly not sleeping at the moment—but if it's to spite you, I will do my best._

 

Smiling, she sets letter and note back on the table, and turns out her light.


	6. The Battle of Arcadia

It _is_ all relative, Braxiatel thinks. A year of Gallifreyan time isn't the same as a year of Sunari time, or Monan, or Nekkistani. Brax supposes that other Time Lords might consider that a comfort, somehow, or else disconcerting, the idea that this is in some way a different war for Gallifrey's enemies than it is for his own people. It's neither of those things to Brax. It's just a fact, one of a thousand facts and figures about this war that he keeps ready at his fingertips. On an average day since the fighting started, twenty point six TARDISes have been shot down, versus an average forty-one point three enemy timespace vessels. The foundries on Therolon alone use 15,000 chronons a day in the production of various temporal armaments. In the recent incident on Gryben—the word is always 'incident', never 'slaughter,' 'chaos,' 'terror'—six hundred and five Gallifreyans and alien refugees were killed. Five hundred and fifty-seven of them were civilians. Eighty-six of them, by the standards of their own respective races, were children.

Facts. All facts. Just numbers. Just words. The conflict that will one day be called the Last Great Time War has been underway for just over one Gallifreyan year, and the real war is not yet begun—but will be, very soon. These things, too, are facts, though in a different sense than the events of last week. Brax has long since lost any distinction between facts-to-be, facts-that-are, and facts-that-were. It's all one fact, one big picture, the tapestry of time stretched out in one proud procession, and the single fact that Braxiatel must keep hold of at all costs is where he is along it, what his relationship happens to be to this strange, fleeting place that the rest of the universe calls 'now.' And so he keeps the anniversary at the front of his mind: for one year, one week and six days, Gallifrey has been at war. And in less than one full Gallifreyan day, the real nature of that conflict will finally begin to unfold.

If Brax didn't need to remind himself that time will always march to the same beat, he might permit himself the thought that it cannot possibly happen soon enough.

*

One year and two weeks. It's all felt like more than long enough, while it was happening, but now that the war is nearly drawing to an end, Romana finds that there is a sort of satisfaction about it all.

Four months ago, Gallifreyan bombers finally succeeded in breaching Sunari shielding for long enough to seed the entire Sunari homeworld with stasis devices, effectively freezing the entire planet in time; the Sunari surrender was reached within spans. It took until six weeks ago for Gallifreyan technicians to construct a device to counter the force fields around the planet of Nekkistan, and the pitched space battle that took place over that planet claimed a higher casualty count than any other encounter of the war so far. Between a bit of technical genius from the Doctor that permitted them to tap into Nekkistani communications, a few extremely unconventional but ultimately brilliant tactical suggestions from Leela, and Brax's apparently limitless knowledge of Nekkistani military procedure, however, the day was won for Gallifrey. After only a few days of Time Lord occupation, the Nekkistani people pushed their government into issuing a surrender of its own.

Only the Monans still stand against Gallifrey, and while the fight on that front grows more formidable all the time, Romana has seen enough of mortality to know that any struggle grows most vicious in the moments just before its end. Yes, the skirmishes in and around the Vortex have grown more frequent and more deadly in recent weeks, but while several Monan timeships have recently been able to fight their way into the timestream, none of them have yet managed to fight their way out alive. And significant progress is being made on the Gallifreyan side in the difficult task of accessing the Monan Hostworld.

The Monans' planet exists in the center of a temporal labyrinth, nestled in the mobius fold of timespace that created the Hostworld in the first place. It's a natural defense mechanism as formidable as any artificial barrier could possibly be. The precise coordinates necessary to materialize on the Hostworld are impossible to fix, and attempting to fly in manually means navigating areas of treacherous, shifting temporal disturbance that can catapult a ship halfway across the universe in a moment of careless contact, or send it hurtling into another universe entirely, or age it a trillion years in a nanospan, or, worst of all, erase it from the timeline so completely that neither vessel nor pilot ever existed at all, except as a fragment of memory in the Matrix's secure databanks.

Over ten thousand generations of evolution, the Monans themselves have developed the necessary instincts to permit them to navigate safely through their own galactic front yard. For Gallifrey, coming to grips with the Monan Timefields has been a learning process, and so far those few vessels that have managed to reach the planet's atmosphere unharmed have all fallen victim to Monan guns before they could touch the surface. But Gallifreyan sensor technology is improving, and Time Lord pilots undergoing new methods of selection and training, and Romana is confident that it won't be much longer before a ground assault on the Hostworld becomes a possibility. In the meantime, they've established a very secure blockade around the Hostworld—if Gallifrey cannot find her way in, then neither will anyone else. Starved of all imported goods, cut off from the wider universe, Monan morale should quickly deteriorate. The War may have edged into its second year, but Romana would bet a good deal that it won't make it into its third.

She's been more fortunate than she could ever have hoped, and she knows it. This war could so easily have escalated into an enormous, all-consuming conflict, completely out of control: shredding the universe, wrecking the web of time, and decimating every technologically advanced race from Event One to the End of All Things. Not that it's only been luck that has kept the war so relatively sane, of course, and not that she isn't cognizant of how much this conflict _has_ cost. She knows better than anyone how much of the effort of this war has gone to defending the Vortex, and to keeping the fighting from impacting non-combatants. And while the loss of life hasn't been staggering, either among Gallifreyans or the races they're fighting, she has always believed that any death among her people for such senseless reasons is too much.

Still, that's all the more reason to celebrate the end of this war, the victory she can see looming on the horizon. She has every reason to be optimistic—and, she thinks, setting aside the report she's been reading in bed and glancing at the unopened envelope on her nightstand, those reasons aren't _all_ professional.

In the course of a year, Romana has grown accustomed to the strange balance that is her relationship with Narvin these days. He still writes to her every week, on every subject imaginable. He often makes her laugh, and not infrequently makes her blush, and always takes her away from her life as the President, lets her forget her burdens for just those few microspans a week. Sometimes he talks politics just to annoy her, the sort of playful antagonism they've always exchanged, and sometimes he talks about the two of them in ways that leave her simultaneously touched and confused, and sometimes he tells her about his life on Arcadia, which, she's surprised to find, often means her favorite letters of all. About two months ago, one of Narvin's missives told the story of the time he lost his temper with a commanding officer and called the man a bumbling moron (among other things) with half the base listening in. The incident earned Narvin an official reprimand, but also, to his considerable shock, garnered him the respect and admiration of every other soldier on the base, a rite of passage into some kind of military brotherhood he'd been excluded from until then. The tale made Romana smile for spans afterwards, both as a former boss familiar with the pointy end of Narvin's insults, and as a Time Lady who, like his fellows on Arcadia, had only learned to see his good side after knowing him a considerable time.

She's seeing quite a bit of his good side, recently. If she were generous with herself, she would attribute her attitude to the simple influence of absence and its positive impact on the fondness of hearts, but she knows her own faults well enough to see that it's more than that. She _knows_ she's being selfish where he is concerned, leaving them both in this state of perpetual indecision. She could write back to him. She could tell him plainly that he's better off without her, gently force him to accept that the best thing for him is to forget her. Or...she could forgive him. She could grant that one disagreement hasn't been enough to kill everything they were to each other before. She could call him home, back into her life, and accept everything that would mean.

But the moment she writes to him everything will change, and right now things are so _easy_ , she thinks, ruefully. It's so simple to accept what he is giving her, these weekly outpourings of devotion, every good feeling he continues to feed her without demanding anything of her in return. A real relationship, a partnership, what they had before he left, that requires mutual effort to keep in working order, but what they have now isn't costing her anything at all. Except, of course, for the increasing debt she is accruing to her own conscience.

No matter what, this state of affairs can't last forever. The war is going to end, she thinks, as she lifts his newest letter and slits open the envelope. It will end, and he'll come home. And when she sees him again...well, then she'll either have to take him back, or not. She'll have to make a decision. Or perhaps she already has, and that's why she's smiling as she unfolds his letter.

 

 _R-_

 _I told you I would write every week. I will, because I promised you._

 _I never promised to have anything worth saying._

 _There was an ambush today. The Monans stole a TARDIS. I don't know how. Traffic control on Arcadia are overworked and understaffed and let them through._

 _I've been near bombs before. I saved you from one, if you remember, and you never once said thank you. This wasn't like that. This was like a world made out of fire and screaming. A fifth of my Time Lord troops are dead, but the Phaidon had it much worse. Time Lords roast, did you know that? You could probably guess. We roast, or we burn, but Warpsmiths melt. They melt, screaming and screaming and alive until they aren't, with a smell that chokes anyone near and clings to everything. I've scrubbed, and I've scrubbed, and I can't get it off of me. Maybe this paper will reach you smelling like ash and death and melted Warpsmith, and the President of Gallifrey will catch the scent of war, for just a moment._

 _I can't be good for you today, Romana. I can't pretend to be the good man I haven't ever been, and fight to keep your hopes up. I can only just stop myself from hating you, if you want to know. Would one word have been too much? It's been fifty-four letters, fifty-four weeks, more than a year here fighting for you, and I'm writing to you with burnt fingers, and today I've held three men while they died, and in a year you haven't sent me a single word. Why, Romana? Because your pride won't let you? You're in love with me, Romanadvoratrelundar, and you're letting the both of us be miserable just because you can. And all I want in this universe tonight is to bury my nose in your hair and fall asleep like that, because you could never smell like living flesh burning._

 _You never once said thank you._

 _N_

 

She clutches at the paper in her hand, without moving. For three full microspans she stares into nothing, and doesn't think at all. And then she sets the letter down calmly on her nightstand.

There is a black silk dressing gown at the foot of her bed. She stands up, and puts it on. She has been wearing much more black recently. She hasn't realized why, before now.

Romana walks barefooted into her sitting room, conscious of the way her toes sink into the plush carpet, as she isn't of anything else. She sits quietly on the sofa, and looks up at the Matrix access screen, hanging over the fireplace in the guise of her favorite Manet.

"Activate," she says.

It does. "Communications link. Arcadia, base thirty-four. The President of Gallifrey to speak to Captain Narvindrasterienableth. Urgent. Do not activate visual contact until Narvin is on the line."

She's left staring at a blank screen for long microspans. And then, with no warning, she isn't staring at a blank screen anymore.

He looks haggard and worn. He looks older. He looks so, so tired. And she knows from his face that he's thinking exactly the same things about her, even though he's trying hard not to show any emotion, and mostly succeeding.

They stare at each other for a long time. She still isn't thinking quite right. "Madam President," he says, at last, and that's all.

She isn't controlling her own lips. She only lets the words come out, in a whisper.

"Thank you."

What little color there was in his face drains away. He blinks, and suddenly he's there, _actually_ there behind his own eyes, alive. He presses his mouth closed in a deliberate way that implies it would hang gaping if he let it, and he swallows.

"You're welcome," he says, and then can't seem to find anything else to add, and closes his mouth.

She can't seem to find anything else to add, either. She doesn't know what she wants to say. She thinks that's probably been the problem for a very, very long time. Letting her mouth run on ahead of her has got her through the conversation so far, however, if two words from her and four from him and a great deal of staring can count as a conversation. It's worth a try, anyway.

"Narvin..."

"Romana..." he says, in the very same moment, and they both stop short.

And then there is a sound from behind him. It's blood-chillingly familiar, and not in the way she expects the sounds of war to be. She knows many kinds of laser blasts, but that one is very, very particular, and she knows it, and so does he. He whirls as a chorus of screams emerges from behind him, and she notes that he's in some kind of command center, one she can't see very clearly, and that suddenly the room is full of activity. Time Lords and Phaidon are running everywhere, and a line of terribly, terribly familiar shapes are advancing, and she knows what they are going to say, before they say it.

"Narvin!" she screams.

"EX-TER-MIN-ATE!" screech an entire platoon of Daleks.

For an instant, Romana's viewscreen becomes a blinding flash of blue, and then it goes black, as the connection is lost.

*

Romana is running out of her quarters before she can think, running through her antechamber and into what was once her outer office, and is now her personal command center. Even at this time of night it's full of Time Lords and Ladies, most of whom she doesn't even recognize.

"Arcadia!" she gasps. "The Daleks are attacking Arcadia!"

As one, the entire room turns to stare at her. "But Madam President," says a baby-faced, rather spotty Time Lord in hideous yellow robes, "the Daleks aren't fighting in this war."

"Clearly, they are now!" she says. " _Move_ , why don't you all! I want information. I want every vantage of Arcadia we can get up on those viewscreens, _now_ , and contact with the commanders of any base that will respond. And you," she points at the Time Lord in yellow, "run and get me Chancellor..."

"I'm here, Madam President," says Brax, stepping through the door.

"Make that Adviser Leela and Under-Coordinator Andred, then," says Romana. "And the Doctor, if you can find him. And Minister Delox, I suppose. What are you waiting for, the end of the universe? Go!"

"Commander Hedrellian of base fifteen, Madam President," calls the Time Lady manning a Matrix terminal across the room, and Romana rushes over.

"Situation report, Commander!"

"Dalek ambush, four microspans ago, Madam President. Significant casualties in initial attack, but we seem to be beating them back for the moment, Madam President. It may not last. We have no idea how many of them there are."

"Your weapons are proving effective against them, Commander? I wasn't sure whether..."

" _All_ stasers and turret canons produced by Gallifreyan forces have been specifically designed to affect Daleks since the beginning of the war, ma'am." Laser fire sounds in the distant background, and Romana watches the commander flinch, clearly itching to get back to his troops.

"Report back when the base is secured, Commander, and await further orders," Romana instructs. "Until then, keep yourself alive."

He salutes, and the screen goes dark.

"Who gave those orders?" Romana asks, turning to Brax. "I should have thought of that myself, and whoever did will have saved an _enormous_ number of lives."

"I did, Madam President," says a voice from just outside the doorway, as the Doctor walks in.

"Why did you think to..."

"Because I've known since before the war ever started that the Daleks were planning to get involved. More than that—one might even call this _their_ war. They had more than a minor hand...well, tentacle...in starting it in the first place. Technician, please pull up the vidfeed for detention cell one one seven two. Authorization code epsilon phi nine two bee."

An image pops to life on one of the viewscreens, and Romana stares at it, quirking her head to the side. "Is that...what _is_ that, Doctor?"

"That," says the Doctor, "both is and is not Mephistopheles Arkadian."

The figure on the screen is Arkadian-shaped. It has his face. But that face has opened off from the front of his head, like a door, to reveal a tangle of wires and circuitry, and two glowing red discs in an eerie approximation of eyes.

"An android?" she gasps. "Doctor, you're trying to tell me that Arkadian..."

"Not always," he says. "Not the one you first met, or I'm fairly certain he wasn't. I don't think the Daleks have developed the technology to design personalities from the ground up, not ones complex enough to pass muster. Right now, they're limited to hijacking the minds and memories of real human beings, then implanting them in robotic bodies. They're creating life-forms that are functionally autonomous, with all the strengths, weaknesses, capacities and desires of their originals, but hardwired to accept Dalek directives."

"And the real Arkadian..."

"I don't know that either," the Doctor admits. "He may be alive and well and roaming the universe, for all I know. But the Arkadian who went to such trouble to engineer this war was mechanical, did it under Dalek suggestion, and is sitting temporarily de-activated in cell one one seven two. I'm sure they chose him because they realized you'd believe him as a warmonger, and wouldn't suspect that his motives were anything beyond those of a war profiteer drumming up business."

"Why, Doctor? Why did they want this war? Were they just trying to see the Time Lords weakened so they could take our place?"

"Oh, much more than that. You know their ambitions, Romana. They're trying to see _all_ the temporal powers weakened, so they can gain complete control over timespace. They may be temporarily allied with the Monans, or with some faction of them; I'm not certain about that. But if they are, they'll break that alliance the moment they see their opening. You haven't been fighting the war you thought you were fighting."

"And you have been," she says, eying him critically. "And hadn't thought to tell me."

He grins. "You said I was unpredictable the day you hired me, Romana. If you hadn't been so busy telling me what I already knew, you might have thought to ask me why I'd been planning on coming to Gallifrey to see you. I'd had a bit of a run in with the Daleks the week before, and may have uncovered one or two little things about their plans—and when I heard that the thing that tried to assassinate you, on Arkadian's orders, was an android designed not to look like an android, I put the rest of the pieces together. I _would_ have told you, but by that time you'd already made me Coordinator, and I thought I might as well get used to not telling you things."

"If you hadn't prevented the wholesale slaughter of an entire planet of my troops today, you realize we'd be having words now, Doctor."

"I guessed as much, yes."

"I'm not certain that slaughter has been prevented yet," says Brax, stepping in from the sidelines. "We have a situation update, Madam President."

 

*

There are certain advantages, Narvin thinks wryly, to being overly familiar with the wrong end of stun blasts and explosions. He's been knocked unconscious by violent means more often than he can keep track of any more, and it's instilled a certain sangfroid about the whole affair. His instinctive reaction to the shriek of laser fire and the booming of explosives isn't so much fear of death as the resigned conviction that he is going to wake up tomorrow with a splitting headache and another pair of robes singed beyond repair. Someday, perhaps, he'll be so jaded that he grows reckless on the battlefield, a liability to himself and those under his command. Today, however, that coolness under fire is of considerable use.

"Under cover, all of you! Everyone, down," he barks at the control room full of panicked Time Lords, Time Ladies and Warpsmiths, fighting or fleeing from the oncoming ranks of Daleks that are firing indiscriminately as they advance. "Engage temporal interference fields now."

As he's been speaking, Narvin has rapidly toppled the table where he was sitting, positioning it between himself and the Daleks and ducking behind it. He spares a moment to tug the young Time Lord beside him under cover, rolling his eyes at the boy's expression of frozen shock, and wondering how the idiot isn't dead already. Reaching into his pocket, Narvin quickly locates the device he's after (his co-workers in his early days at the CIA teased him mercilessly for the orderly filing system he employs in his dimensionally transcendental pockets, but he considers himself to be having the last laugh now), adjusts the settings, pulls out the firing pin, and tosses it into the center of the advancing contingent of Daleks.

It would take a much more complicated and less portable device to completely stop time in so large a space, especially when that space contains so many living beings—there must be at least a hundred Daleks crowded into the control center, which is a large, open room, a hangar more than anything. But Narvin's timebomb is enough to dramatically slow the flow of time for all but those Daleks at the extreme edges of the group. Almost all of the three dozen Time Lords and Phaidon in the control center seem to have managed to turn on their temporal interference fields, wrist-worn devices that render them immune to the timeshift that is slowing the Daleks and their laser bolts to a crawl.

"Target the unaffected Daleks first, then move on to the others," Narvin shouts. "Pick your shots, and aim for the eyestalks. Non-combat forces, focus on getting affected Gallifreyans under cover and engaging their interference fields. And _watch out_ for those laser blasts, they'll kill you just as dead in slow-motion."

A pair of Time Lords are making their way around the edge of the room towards Narvin's position. He spares half a moment to watch, between poking his nose above his makeshift barricade to pick off another few Daleks. There is a jangling noise to his right as the two Time Lords reach Narvin's position and kneel beside him. It's barely audible over the continuous cries of 'Exterminate!', distorted into a low, almost melodic chant at some twenty times slower than usual.

"Commander Nees," says the trembling boy Narvin rescued a moment ago, nervously saluting the new arrival.

"Sir," Narvin says, sourly. He doesn't turn to look, but continues shooting, dodging left as a Dalek laser bolt whizzes just past his head.

"Captain Narvin," says Commander Nees, "you seem to be confused as to who is in command of this situation."

Narvin is so well-used to being loathed that it's almost soothing to be addressed in that tone of voice. The Commander has been threatened by Narvin's status from the moment Narvin arrived on-base. He can understand how it might be uncomfortable for Nees, finding himself unexpectedly in charge of a Time Lord who had outranked him tenfold only the day before—not to mention a man with a public reputation whose personal dealings with the Supreme Commander of Gallifrey's armed forces have been a staple subject of the gossip feeds for years—but Narvin is not a naturally sympathetic person, and understanding is a different thing from caring. It probably doesn't help matters that Narvin considers Nees an incompetent fool, and hasn't ever taken any trouble to disguise the fact.

"Oddly enough, _sir_ , I don't believe I am," says Narvin.

"Your insubordination will not be tolerated, soldier," says Nees, in a voice that attempts to be booming, and comes very far from hitting the mark.

"If you had given any orders, Commander, I would of _course_ have followed them. As you apparently couldn't be bothered, it seemed a conscientious act to relieve you of that burden by giving some for you. Unless your intention was to see every Time Lord and Lady on this base blasted to death, in which case I do apologize for the misunderstanding."

The Commander stands, clearly with some notion of intimidating Narvin with his looming. "Sir," says the Time Lord who accompanied the Commander—his Adjutant, a Time Lord named Garrick whom Narvin knows slightly, and respects far more than he ever has Nees. "I don't think that's..."

Garrick is interrupted by a Dalek laser bolt that spatters into a dark burn mark on the far wall—but only after hitting square in the middle of Nees's forehead.

"...wise," Garrick finishes, as Nees's corpse crumples and falls to the floor beside him.

"Thank Rassilon," Narvin mutters, before he can think about it. When it occurs to him what he's just said, he darts a sidelong glance at Garrick. "I don't mean...you weren't close?"

"He was a pompous idiot," says Garrick, toeing Nees's carcass out of his way with a look of cool distaste. "I suppose I'd be obliged to regret him, if it wasn't for the fact that his death will likely save a thousand lives. He'd have run this base into the ground." Garrick salutes in Narvin's direction. "I'm certain you'll do better for us, Commander Narvin."

Narvin blinks. "I think you're promoting me prematurely, Adjutant," he says. "There are a pair of Tribunes on this base, not to mention five Captains more senior than I am, and..."

"And the Daleks targeted the officers' quarters first," says Garrick. "They're all dead. This base and what's left of the Twenty-Third are yours, Commander."

When Narvin woke up this morning, the Twenty-Third company comprised over twelve hundred Time Lord and Phaidon troops—well under their full strength of fifteen hundred since yesterday's Monan attack, but still a significant force. Even if the casualties of this ambush have been considerable, he's just had at least a thousand lives placed in his hands. By way of taking a moment to process that idea, Narvin turns back to the crowd of temporally hobbled Daleks at the center of the room. Only five of them are still crawling across the floor, the rest already blown wide open by Gallifreyan fire. He calmly sights, and takes out two, three, four of them. Before he can take the last shot, the fifth Dalek's dome blows off, and beside Narvin, Garrick holsters his staser.

"I suspect I'm going to enjoy working with you, Garrick," says Narvin, looking the other Time Lord over, and offering his hand. "You clasp it and shake," he adds. "Imported custom. All the rage on Gallifrey these days. Gesture of trust and goodwill." Garrick shakes Narvin's hand with an expression of mild surprise. "Now, Adjutant, what say we do something about removing these metal vermin from our base, and then see if we can't foil whatever grand scheme they've got in the works."

"Yes, sir," agrees Garrick, with a hint of a smile.

"Right," says Narvin, scanning the Daleks one last time to be quite certain they're no longer a threat, and then standing. "To me, all of you," he shouts, and every Time Lord and Lady in the room looks up at him. "We've got work to do."

*

"Apparently, Madam President, the Daleks began their invasion by seizing control of central traffic command on Arcadia, and have been using the localized transmats from there to transport strike forces into each of Arcadia's eighty-six bases. These strike forces are relatively small, only about two hundred Daleks each; they were clearly depending on the element of surprise, thus the decision to attack every base on the planet simultaneously. So far, we only know of a dozen bases that have fallen completely, but many others have suffered heavy casualties."

"How did the Daleks _possibly_ manage to smuggle seventeen thousand troops onto Arcadia without anyone noticing?" asks the Doctor.

"We're not entirely certain about that yet," Brax admits, "but from what little we can gather, the Dalek force on Arcadia is much, much larger than the mere seventeen thousand that participated in the initial strike."

"Two hundred thousand," says Romana. "That's the size of a Dalek invasion force—no more, no less. They may not be mechanical all the way through, but they're as precise as any computer where numbers are concerned. And I think I know how they got in. You said they were holed up in Arcadia's traffic control center?"

"Yes, that's right," agrees Brax, a hint of a question in his tone.

"Sometime in the last day or so, the Monans attacked Arcadia by means of a stolen TARDIS. That TARDIS, once it was recaptured, would have been impounded—hauled back to traffic control. No doubt our forces on Arcadia tried to search the TARDIS, but in a dimensionally transcendental vessel..."

"You think two hundred thousand Daleks arrived in a single TARDIS?" asks Brax. "When it could so easily have been shot down? Surely the risk..."

"Romana's right, I'd bet my boots on it," says the Doctor. "The Daleks don't care for the lives of individuals of their own race, any more than they do for individuals of ours. Even an entire invasion force could be written off as an acceptable risk, if they thought their chances of success were high enough."

"Which means that the attacks on our bases have only been the beginning," Romana says. "Even before the Daleks landed, there were only about 130,000 Time Lord troops on Arcadia, and we've got to assume casualties of at least a fifth in this initial strike. We have to bring in reinforcements, _now_."

"There's a problem with that, Madam President." Romana, Brax and the Doctor look up in time to see Andred and Leela walk through the door. Andred is studying a CIA communicator in his hand. "Arcadia's transduction barriers seem to be malfunctioning."

"Malfunctioning?" Romana asks, sharply. "And here we've been speculating on how the Daleks could have made it in. You're telling me that _anyone_ can just waltz onto one of our planets?"

"No, my Lady. The barriers aren't open, they're completely locked down. Nothing can get in or out. Even Matrix contact is only possible because the signals are being beamed back in time, to a moment when the barriers were open, and routed back to us."

"Of course," says Brax. "If the Daleks have Arcadia traffic central, then they've got control of the transduction barriers. With sufficient technical expertise, they could disable Gallifrey's ability to remotely raise or lower the barriers. And that won't be the only thing they've done. Andred, check whether they've..."

"They have," says the Doctor, looking up from the Matrix terminal he's commandeered. "All TARDIS traffic on Arcadia has been grounded, and all turret guns remotely locked. And we can't do anything about it, from here."

"I think perhaps it is a good thing that your walls stay standing," says Leela, staring at something behind Romana's back.

"What do you..." Romana begins, and then stops short as she turns. Leela is watching a Matrix viewscreen that displays a satellite view of Arcadia, hanging in space—or it's supposed to. At the moment, however, the planet itself is barely visible. It's too well hidden by the enormous fleet of Dalek ships, swarming in every direction.

"Rassilon, Omega and the Other," says Andred, harshly, under his breath.

All five of them stare in disbelieving silence for a very long moment. One by one, Romana feels the others turn to look at her.

"So," says the Doctor, slowly, "just let's review, shall we? We've got perhaps 100,000 Gallifreyans scattered in pockets across Arcadia, most of them far more experienced as engineers than soldiers, faced with a united assault force of at least 180,000 armored Daleks. They've got limited communications, no large artillery, no ships to shoot the Daleks down from, and no prospect of either reinforcement or evacuation. And that's _not_ taking into account the battle fleet." Romana can feel herself going pale, as she finally turns to meet his eye.

"A very accurate summation of the situation, Coordinator," she says, distantly.

"Which leaves us with only one question," says Brax. "How in Rassilon's name are we going to prevent the wholesale slaughter of every single Time Lord on the planet?"

*

"We've got to change the odds," says Narvin, scanning Matrix readouts as quickly as he can, before his very sketchy connection goes down again. He and his small band of Time Lords have managed to retake their base by the simple expedient of introducing a fast-acting stun gas into the ventilation system. Narvin and the troops he'd brought with him from the command center had known to engage their respiratory bypass systems in advance; every other Time Lord and Dalek on the base was knocked out. After that, it had been a simple matter of rounding up the remaining Daleks, instituting a swift round of executions, and waiting for the rest of the Twenty-Third company to come around. "It's either that, or accept the inevitability of a swift extermination. I don't know about you, Garrick, but I consider myself too young for that just yet. I have better things to do."

"Yes, sir," says Adjutant Garrick, with a slight smile. "How precisely do you propose to see the odds changed?"

"Gallifrey would send in reinforcements, if only we could get the transduction barriers down."

"But the Daleks have traffic control, sir. It's one of the most secure buildings on the planet, a bunker, and they must be keeping it heavily garrisoned besides. Even if you could get half the troops on the planet together, it's unlikely we could take it back."

"True," says Narvin. "If we were fighting to get the barriers _up_ , that would be an insurmountable obstacle. But we want to see them come _down_. It's always easier to tear down than to build, Adjutant."

"You have a plan, then, sir?"

"I've been working on the defense systems of this planet for a year now—including the transduction barriers. The primary control mechanism for the transduction barriers may be inside traffic control, but there are a pair of power stations a few kilometers from traffic control, here and here," Narvin gestures at a map he's pulled up on the viewscreen in the Commander's office, "that feed directly into the barriers. The power stations aren't _designed_ to allow control of the barriers from on-site, but the circuits there are crucial enough to their function that a man with sufficient technical expertise should be able to take the barriers down from there."

"And I'm to assume that you are the man in question, sir."

"Well, I don't like to brag, but...yes. Yes, I am," says Narvin, pleased and smug.

"And how do you propose that we get to this power station, Commander?" says Garrick, wryly. "This is nearly a quarter of the way across the planet, the Daleks have control of the transmats, and every TARDIS, transport pod and skimmer on Arcadia is grounded."

"Garrick, I'm surprised at you," says Narvin. The thought occurs to him that he may possibly be enjoying himself too much, but he thinks he's earned one good day after the kind of year he's had. "We're on a planet the sole industry of which is the production of vehicles of every description. The Time Lords and Ladies on this base know _everything_ about transport. You really think we can't rig up something to get a thousand troops to the other side of a very small sort of planet within a span or so?"

"A thousand, sir?" he asks. "The full company? What about the base?"

"We'll need every soldier we can get. The Daleks aren't likely to have considered the power stations before, but the moment we head in that direction, they're bound to notice. We'll need to be able to hold the station long enough to get the barriers down, and keep them down long enough for reinforcements to arrive. Not to mention..." Narvin gestures to the map again. "If the bulk of the Dalek force is at traffic control, here, they're actually in a very isolated area. It was built into these mountains specifically to keep it secure, for all the good _that_ seems to have done. They can't just transmat all their troops, not more than a few hundred at a time, and that'd defeat the point of overwhelming numbers. Which means that when they do mobilize their forces to take the planet, they'll have to come right through this pass, here, just beside the power station. There's no way we can hope to _stop_ them, not with only a thousand of us. But if we can delay them, hold them for as long as we can, then maybe we can stop the rest of the planet being slaughtered before reinforcements arrive. With the terrain on our side, we may have some hope of slowing them down a little, anyway."

"The casualties among our troops..."

"...will be horrific," says Narvin. "I don't doubt that. But if we're going to die today, wouldn't you rather go down fighting, Garrick?"

Garrick studies Narvin's face, and then salutes. "I'll follow you, sir," he says, simply.

"Good man," says Narvin, clapping the other Time Lord on the shoulder. "Let's go make it happen, shall we?"

*

Romana is still struggling to come up with an answer when the Doctor starts to laugh.

Andred's, Leela's, Brax's and Romana's eyes swivel to him immediately. "Brax, _Brax_ , I have never in my lives met anyone so skilled in the art of missing the point," says the Doctor, grinning all over his face. "The first time I've had real fun in a year, and _naturally_ you disapprove."

"Doctor," says Romana, sharply, "if you think..."

"Smile, Romana! We're about to do something _brilliant_ ," the Doctor announces, practically bouncing with glee. "Doesn't that sound lovely?"

To Romana's left, Leela starts to laugh, too. "There it is!" says the Doctor.

"You have a plan," says Leela, practically doubled over with laughter. "Of _course_ you have a plan. Oh, Doctor, I have missed you."

"I think we'd all better hear what this grand plan _is_ before we pin any hopes on it," says Braxiatel, suspicion in his eyes.

"I concur," says Romana, but she can't quite quash the fluttering of hope in her hearts, and she can tell it's on her face, too, by the way the Doctor smiles at her.

"The soldiers on the planet will be the next thing, Romana, but dealing with that fleet shouldn't be any trouble at all," he says, rocking back and forth on his heels. "It's the transduction barrier, don't you see? They've insisted on keeping it up. Which is brilliant when it comes to keeping our troops trapped, yes, but not such a very safe thing to have right behind you, is it? One touch and poof!" The Doctor claps his hands together. "That transduction barrier isn't a fence, it's a _minefield_ , and all we need to do is get them to stumble into it. They're backed right up on a force field that can disintegrate their entire fleet."

"And you suppose that they'll just fly their ships into it because you ask them nicely?" asks Braxiatel.

"I always find that asking people nicely is a good first step, but after as much adventuring as I've done, I _have_ noticed that a backup plan is generally useful," says the Doctor. "Just for example, I had thought of materializing inside the engines of the Dalek ships and rerouting them? Terribly simple, Dalek engines. Switching them into reverse is almost no trouble at all, and with the right tool," the Doctor slips a hand into his pocket, pulls out his sonic screwdriver, and twirls it between his fingers, "it can be done without the Daleks themselves even noticing. So the moment they try to move away from the barriers..."

"They'll fly backwards, straight into them!" says Romana. "Doctor, that's..."

"...Absurd," says Brax, curtly. "There must be a thousand ships in that fleet. Do you expect to personally sabotage every one of them?"

"Oh, I think that would get a bit dull, don't you? I thought I'd just stop in at the mothership, myself. A team of three on each Dalek ship ought to be backup enough to get the job done right, with minimal casualties. Now if only, just for example, I happened to be the man in charge of an Agency of three thousand highly trained spies, all with TARDISes of their own... And if I'd happened to have given orders that sonic screwdrivers were to be distributed standard issue... Well, then the only thing left to figure out, really, would be who was coming with me, wouldn't it?" He looks from Leela to Romana and back again. "I mean, I would like to have somebody experienced in these sorts of things. Used to dealing with me, and the kinds of situations I always seem to get myself into. Possibly the sorts who enjoy a good adventure. In short, a pair of women—let's just say women, for the sake of argument—who are more than a match for me in every way. Know anyone like that, Leela?"

Romana isn't sure she's ever seen Leela smile so completely. "I can think of someone," she says.

"And you," says the Doctor, turning to Romana, "my eternally grand Lady President?"

Romana looks at the Doctor's glittering eyes. "Madam President," says Brax, harshly, "you cannot possibly be considering..."

She turns to Brax, swallows, and bites her lip. And then she's made her decision, and suddenly she's grinning just as brightly as the Doctor and Leela. Brax opens his mouth, but before he can speak, Romana has gone up on tiptoes, and pecked him quickly on the cheek. "If I don't make it back, Braxiatel, I leave my planet to you," she says, pulling away from him with a smile. "There's no one else I'd ever trust in that office."

"Andred," says the Doctor, "everything she just said. But with the CIA, instead of the Presidency, of course. And...well, you don't expect me to..." He gestures towards Andred's cheek. "I mean, if you _want_ me to..."

"I will do that part," says Leela, and then she has her arms around Andred's neck, and her mouth very decidedly on his. For a moment, the entire command center watches with upraised eyebrows, and then the Doctor is tugging Leela by the arm.

"All right, all right, there'll be time enough for that sort of thing _after_ we've defeated the Daleks," says the Doctor. "Come on, come on, to the TARDIS!"

"You will insist on talking as though there's only the one, Doctor," says Romana, smiling, as she slips her arm through his. He reaches out his other hand, and Leela takes it, with a last smile for Andred.

"At moments like this, Romana, would you really trust any other TARDIS to get the job done?"

She looks to the Doctor, and then to Leela, and then back to Brax, and spares one quick thought for someone else, a very long way away. "No, I wouldn't," she admits, with a smile. "It's moments like this that I know _exactly_ who to trust."

*

"You know your orders," says Narvin, his voice booming out over the parade ground of base thirty-four. "I won't pretend this mission isn't dangerous for us all. But the Daleks _will_ be coming for us, and I'd rather risk my life today for a chance at seeing next week than wait quietly here for a sure extermination tomorrow. And if these are my last spans in this universe, I know at least that I'll go out in some damn fine company. Are you with me?"

There is a general cheer. "This mission is simple. We'll have the hills as our defense, the best ground we could hope for, and all we've got to do is keep it, just as long as we can. I promise you this: if there's still breath in my body, I _will_ get those barriers down. And when I do, there'll be a fleet of battle TARDISes just waiting to fly down and blast those Daleks off the face of this world. This is going to be the battle of our lives, my Lords and Ladies. I don't know about you," he grins at the crowd, "but I think I might just like that idea."

The rest of his unit whistles and applauds, and Narvin looks out over them, wondering where this feeling has been all his lives. Matthias, the smug git, once accused Narvin of spending his boyhood collecting stamps. Narvin didn't consider it worth his while to inform the then-President that in his youngest days, as a Time Tot not yet even old enough for the Academy, Narvin's interests had run to the adventure tales and war stories he uncovered in the deepest recesses of his House library, his free time spent in dashing over the mountainside with toy staser in hand, waging imaginary battles with unruly primitives and treacherous criminals. Like any sensible Gallifreyan, Narvin left those sorts of fanciful dreams spinning in the endless depths of the Untempered Schism on the day he grew up, but there were times during his life at the CIA when he was shocked by how much his child-self would have relished his own existence. And this, somehow—this is even better. There is a sense of comradeship here that the Celestial Intervention Agency could never offer. Spying is the business of every man for himself, a career where Narvin found his instinctive patriotism as much a hobble as a help. But the thought that he and all these men and women may just die together, for their planet, is profoundly _good_ somehow.

"You all understand your orders?" he asks. "No questions?"

"What kinds of weapons will the Daleks be fighting with?" calls one Time Lord from the crowd. "Are there different kinds of them? I've never even seen one, before today."

"They don't depend on explosives or heavy guns, and I wouldn't expect air fire. They do almost all their killing with the lasers mounted in their armor. Take a hit to the head or the center of the chest, you can say goodbye to the rest of your lives. Anywhere else, regeneration is likely, but far from guaranteed."

"Do you have any suggestions, sir? For minimizing the chances of a failed regeneration?"

"Don't get shot?" says Narvin, dryly, and there is an appreciative laugh from his audience.

" _I've_ got a question," says a voice, in an overconfident drawl practically _begs_ offense with every syllable. "Tell us, _Commander_ : what's Her Excellency the Lady President like between the sheets?"

The reaction of the crowd is mixed. Some laugh, some are stunned into silence, some whisper frantically to their neighbors. All of them, however, keep their eyes firmly fixed on Narvin.

"Ah. I was wondering whether that would prove to be an issue," Narvin says, dangerously calm. "What's your name, soldier?"

The Time Lords and Ladies near the speaker in the crowd back away several steps to reveal a youngish-looking Time Lady with bright red hair. "Private Melliarianionen, sir."

"Well, Private Melliarianionen," he says. "I'll point out first that I am not a man who cares to be groveled to. I don't mind a little careless familiarity here and there, a bit of friendly insubordination—but there's a time and a place for it, and the eve of battle is not that time and place. And secondly, while I may not care _what_ you say about me, I care very much what you say about my President. You are speaking of the keeper of the Ancient and Sacred Legacy of Rassilon, Private, and you will _not_ treat that lightly. The President of Gallifrey _is_ Gallifrey, and disrespect to her is disrespect for every soldier on this base and the sacrifice we're prepared to make for our planet. It doesn't become a Time Lord to be so glib about anything whatever, but even if you insist on behaving like a boorish infant in public, you and everyone else on this base _will_ show respect for the Lady Romanadvoratrelundar, or I'll have you court martialed so fast it'll make your head spin. Is that perfectly clear?"

There is a long moment of absolute silence. "Yes, sir," says Melliarianionen, finally.

"And Private?"

"Sir?"

Narvin studies the Time Lady in the crowd. "Why do you think I'm fighting so hard for a chance to get home in one piece?"

It takes Melliarianionen a few nanospans to decide whether or not Narvin means what she thinks he does. And then his lips quirk, just for a moment, and she grins like there's no tomorrow (which, he thinks, maybe there won't be). The crowd is suddenly rumbling, with chatter and laughter, and there are cheeky smiles on every face Narvin can see.

"Now get to those skimmers, all of you," says Narvin, his voice booming out over the parade ground, a hint of a smile still playing around his lips. "The Daleks won't sit idle while we stand around here chattering!"

*

Romana would hardly have believed it was one of the Doctor's schemes if everything went _completely_ to plan.

"Remind me again why we landed your TARDIS so far away from the Dalek engines, Doctor," she pants.

"Oh, come now, Romana. Would you really consider this a proper adventure if there wasn't any dashing down corridors?"

"They will not catch us, Romana!" says Leela, far less winded than she has any right to be. She dodges sideways as a Dalek laser blast whizzes past her hip. "We are faster."

"At least I remembered to wear sensible..." They are nearly to the end of the corridor when another group of Daleks emerges, directly in front of them. Romana grabs Leela and the Doctor by the shoulders and pushes them both down as she kneels herself. The three Daleks that have been following them fire at precisely the same instant as the three they're running towards. There is a loud sizzling noise, and a tremendous heat just over Romana's head, and the casings of six Daleks burst open at once. "...shoes," she finishes, with a nod of satisfaction, as they all stand again, and keep on running. "Tell me it's just around this corner, Doctor."

"Well...no," says the Doctor, as they round the corner to be faced with another corridor, just as long as the last. "It seems not. I'm sure it can only be one more."

It is, in fact, three more corridors. Leela stasers five more Daleks on the way without ever ceasing to run. Then they've reached the Doctor's TARDIS at last, that beautiful blue box, and all stumble inside in one disordered tangle of Time Lord and human limbs. The Doctor immediately goes for the controls, and within moments they have dematerialized, only to re-materialize floating in space not far above Arcadia, and even closer to the Dalek fleet.

"CIA operatives, one and all," the Doctor calls into the communicator clutched in his hand, "are any of you still on those Dalek ships? Speak now or forever hold your peace!"

"Of nine hundred and eighty three CIA TARDISes sent on this mission, only a dozen of them haven't yet reported back to Gallifrey," says Romana, closing her eyes as she concentrates on the Matrix input flooding into her mind. She didn't bother mentioning to anyone on Gallifrey that she was bringing the Coronet of Rassilon with her on this little adventure. If that was irresponsible of her, she thinks she's entitled to one irresponsible day just every now and then, even if she _is_ the President. Every once in a while, one simply has to throw a chair through the window, as it were. "Ten of them have shut down when their pilots were killed by the Daleks. The other two teams were taken captive before they could complete their missions. Absolutely _none_ of them managed to park further away than you, I think I should point out."

"Running is good for the hearts!" says the Doctor, exuberant. "Right. Andred, can you hear me?"

"Yes, Coordinator," says Andred's voice through the communicator.

"Send in rescue teams for those captured Time Lords. Quickly, please—though no need for us to wait on this part. If they didn't manage to sabotage the Dalek engines, there's no danger to _those_ ships, and we've got to do this quickly before the Daleks realize what's wrong."

"Do what, Doctor?" asks Leela.

The Doctor sets down his communicator on the console of his TARDIS, and reaches up to the monitor screen dangling from his ceiling. He fiddles a variety of dials, with no results. He frowns, pulls out his sonic screwdriver, and beams it at the monitor screen. Nothing happens. He frowns still more deeply, and then his face lights up. With an "Ah!", the Doctor slaps the side of the monitor, and an image swims to life on the screen.

"DOC-TOR!" says the Dalek.

"Dalek Supreme!" says the Doctor, cheerfully, addressing the Dalek on his screen. "What a terrible pity to see you again, have you been well? Yes, good, lovely, so glad we've had this little chat. Look, here I am, floating above Arcadia, and _fancy_ meeting you here. The Doctor, your great enemy, just waiting to be exterminated. _And_ I've got two of my very best friends with me. This is the Lady Leela, Presidential bodyguard, and _this_ is Romana, though she prefers 'Fred.' She's Lord High President of Gallifrey, isn't that nice? Wave hello to the Dalek Supreme, Leela, Romana."

"Hello, metal monster," says Leela.

"Charmed, I'm sure," adds Romana, sourly.

"Ah, yes. Romana doesn't like Daleks much, I'm afraid," says the Doctor, apologetically. "You might have some notion of why? I would stay to chat, but I'm sure she would really rather we didn't. So if you'd like to get your plungers on me, my dear Dalek Supreme," the Doctor says, with a dazzling grin for the camera, "you'll simply have to catch me."

"DOC..." begins the Dalek Supreme

The Doctor turns a switch on the monitor screen, so that it displays the view from just outside the TARDIS, of the planet and the assembled fleet. "Right," says the Doctor. "Hang on to something. This should be..."

Romana grabs a bank of controls, engaging the stablizers and adjusting the inertial boosters. "I _can_ actually help you fly this thing, Doctor," she points out.

"I wouldn't call this a tricky bit of flying," the Doctor counters. "All we're doing is going this way..." He shoves a lever to its highest setting, and suddenly the TARDIS tips nearly horizontal as it zooms away from the planet at tremendous speed. "Leela!" he calls, as he and Romana dance their way around the console in opposite directions, poking at various buttons while holding on for dear life. "Are they following us?"

"They are trying," says Leela, gleefully, her eyes on the monitor. "It is working, Doctor! They are going the other way, and they are about to..."

There isn't any sound, and there isn't any shockwave, not in the emptiness of space. But the flash of light from the monitor that Leela is watching is so bright that it illuminates the entire console room. Then there is another, and another, and another. The TARDIS has nearly righted itself by now, enough for Romana to join Leela on the other side of the console, to watch as the Dalek ships reverse themselves straight into Arcadia's transduction barriers and explode in tremendous bursts, in such quick succession that Romana can only imagine the Daleks aboard haven't even got time to realize that anything is wrong.

"Doctor," she says, "I think you've forgotten something."

"Nonsense, Romana!" he scoffs. "I never forget. This regeneration is very good about those sorts of things. It's been at least a week since my last bout of amnesia."

"What about the parts where there are twelve quite large Dalek ships in that fleet that can fly just fine, they're fully armed, and they're coming straight at us?"

"Ah," says the Doctor. "I may have forgotten that, yes. Prepare to dematerialize!"

"Braxiatel!" calls Romana, pressing the Coronet more firmly onto her head as she reaches out to his mind through the Matrix. "I think the time has come to send in that battle fleet you've been assembling. _Now_ , if you wouldn't mind awfully."

 _You needn't shout, my Lady President_ , says Brax, his cool amusement obvious even in her head. _They're on their way. Might I suggest that this would be an ideal time for you to head for home?_

The Doctor's TARDIS is screeching in the background, and Romana is grinning from ear to ear. _Yes, you may,_ she thinks in Brax's direction, _and you may even be permitted to congratulate me once I get there._

*

Narvin and the Twenty-Third do manage to beat the Daleks to the power station that supplies the transduction barriers—but just barely. They have only time enough to settle into a firm defensive position, under good cover in the rocks of the valley, with a clear view of the wide, winding pass they're trying to keep out of Dalek hands and of the power station built into the cliffside. And then the first wave of Daleks is breaking on them, before Narvin can even grab Adjutant Garrick (Narvin thinks that his new status is enough to merit _one_ soldier pulled from the battlefield to watch his back and carry his bag of tools) and head up to the power station.

Narvin knows he can't stay to lead the first charge, as much as he would like to. He can't risk his life, not yet, not when he's the only man in the Twenty-Third whose knowledge of those transduction barriers is sufficient to bring them down. The new batch of captains he appointed before they left the base are more than capable of handling the situation. But Narvin does manage to take down at least few Daleks as he's backing his way towards the path up to the power station, and before he and Garrick are out of earshot, he makes what he considers to be a far more significant contribution.

It isn't just their armor that makes the Daleks intimidating, nor their ruthlessness, nor the utter alienness of them. Among the weapons in their psychological arsenal—a minor one, perhaps, but worth addressing none the less—is that relentless, chattering battle cry of theirs. 'EX-TER-MIN-ATE!' may not be anything pithy, but it does the job of unsettling the Daleks' opponents. Still, Narvin thinks he can do them one better. A good battle cry should do more than just frighten the enemy, after all. It should also be an inspiration to one's own troops. Cupping his hands around his mouth, Narvin shouts out over the battlefield.

"For Gallifrey and the Lady President!"

The Gallifreyan troops roar with approval as they throw themselves into the fray. And all the way up the mountain, as he and Garrick make their way towards the circuits that will bring down the transduction barrier, Narvin hears the repeated echoes, the two things in the universe worth fighting for, ringing in his ear.

"For Gallifrey and the Lady President!"

*

"Not half bad, was it, Brax?" asks the Doctor, as he, Romana and Leela stroll back into command central, flush with success. "Even you have to admit, that was absolutely no more than a quarter bad."

Brax considers the possibility of admitting how proud he is of all three of them, and almost immediately dismisses it. "I will grant that you did manage to kill the Daleks, and didn't manage to kill the President of Gallifrey," says Brax. "Well done. Forgive me if I reserve any more effusive praise until every Gallifreyan on Arcadia isn't in danger of imminent extermination."

Romana's face falls, to a degree visible only to Brax's trained eye, as she recalls what that fact means to her personally. Brax would have worked a great deal harder to keep her on Gallifrey earlier if he hadn't thought it necessary to her sanity for her to forget, for a little while, just who is on that planet, and why she is so desperate to save it.

"Oh, I'm sure you all can handle that," says the Doctor, brightly. "Andred, come update me on those rescue missions. We'll be just in the next room if you need us, Romana."

"Fine, Doctor," she says, and crosses the room to stand by Brax, Leela at her side. "What's the situation on the ground like, Chancellor?"

"Communications with Arcadia have been extremely sporadic, Madam President—the Daleks clearly have some sort of disruptor in place—but we have intelligence enough to suggest that a mission is underway on-planet to bring down the transduction barriers, one that seems to have a relatively high probability of success."

"That's excellent news," she says, eagerly. "Our fleet is still standing by above the planet?"

"Yes, Madam President," pipes in Minister Delox, from the sidelines, before Braxiatel can respond. He steps forward, and Brax watches Romana's lips pinch with distaste. He may be her Minister of War, but she's got no love for Delox, and no respect for him, either. Brax can't say he likes the man much better. He's not entirely incompetent, but he's also a pessimist, and chronically spineless. Neither is a quality Brax thinks suited to a Time Lord in Delox's position. "In worse news, however," Delox continues, "it appears that Dalek forces are preparing to mobilize for a direct assault on Arcadia's remaining troops. With the disruptions to planetary communications and transportation, Arcadia's forces have been unable to form into any kind of united body. They are still scattered on bases across the planet, in groups far too small to do anything but fall under the force of Dalek numbers."

"If the transduction barriers are about to fall, and reinforcements are on their way..."

"That may still take a not inconsiderable time, Madam President," Brax admits. "It's difficult to be certain. Given the size of any likely Dalek assault force, they may not be able to move very quickly, but..."

"But we cannot rely on that," says Delox. "There is a possible stratagem by which the Daleks may at least be delayed in their advance on the planet, Madam President, but I wanted your approval before putting it into play."

"I'm listening," says Romana, somewhat skeptically.

Someone has pulled up a map of Arcadia, in eight-dimensional hologram, on the map table at the middle of the room. Delox turns to it, and indicates a glowing red dot. "This, Madam President, is where the Dalek force is assembled," he says. "Magnify," he adds, addressing the map itself, and it zooms in on the area surrounding Arcadia traffic control.

"Correct me if I'm wrong," says Romana, "but it appears that the Daleks have chosen an extremely isolated area for their headquarters."

"And wisely so," says Delox. "The natural barriers on all sides provide them a formidable defense against any attempt to attack their position. But they have also exposed themselves to a considerable inconvenience, in that their path out of that position carries them of necessity through a relatively narrow pass in the mountains, here."

"The idea being that if we're going to make a stand, try to slow them down, this pass of yours is the place," says Romana. "That sounds perfectly sensible, except for the fact that, as you yourself pointed out, this area is _isolated_ , Minister. There aren't any bases nearby. We haven't just got a few thousand spare troops lying around the spot, have we?"

"We're not entirely certain how they got there, Madam President, but there does appear to be one company within range," says Delox. "If they do try to make a stand, even with the terrain on their side, they'll be _decimated_ , quite probably wiped out to the last man. But they are our best chance of buying time "

"You're asking me to send fifteen hundred Time Lords and Ladies to certain death for the sake of nothing more concrete than _time_ , Delox? Is there any other way?"

"No, my Lady. If you don't send them in, at least a dozen other companies are likely to fall before reinforcements can arrive, and that's _if_ this mission to lower the transduction barriers succeeds. It has to be done."

"Then why are we having this conversation, Minister? Give orders to our well-placed company that the pass is to be defended at all costs, as soon as communications can be established. I'm going to check in with..."

"It's only...well, Madam President..."

"Yes, Delox?" she asks, clearly wavering on the edge of full-on annoyance.

"Well, you see, the company in question..."

" _What_ , Minister?"

"The company in question is the Twenty-Third, Madam President." Delox swallows visibly, and then stutters, "I...I didn't think...without your direct approval..."

Every bit of color drains from Romana's face in less than a nanospan. Her fingers clench on the edge of the table, and then she goes entirely still.

"Romana?" asks Leela. "What is it?"

"Madam President?" asks Delox. "Should I send them in?"

Romana doesn't move, doesn't speak. "Madam President? Time is of the essence in this..."

Brax crosses the room with quick, sure stride to stand beside Delox. "Send the order, Minister," he says, sharply.

Delox looks to Romana, uneasy. "It ought to be the President who..."

"Do it!" Brax barks.

"Chancellor Braxiatel, you are not..."

"Yes." Romana's whisper is barely audible, but every eye in the room swivels to her. "Do it. Send them in."

There is a momentary silence. "Thank you, Madam President," says Delox, and punches in the codes to relay the order.

"I do not understand," says Leela, softly, pulling Brax to the side, eying Romana uneasily.

"Someone we know is with the Twenty-Third," says Brax, his voice strained, "and none of those men is likely to come back."

Leela's eyes widen. "Narvin?" she asks, in a low murmur.

Romana looks up at the sound of the name, in time to see Brax's nod. Romana meets Brax's glance, and holds it. "Chancellor Braxiatel," she says, hoarsely, "I want an update on the progress of the Orion campaign."

"Right away, Madam President." He crosses the room, takes her by the elbow, and guides her to the door. "Leela? Could you escort the Madam President back to her office? I'll follow in a moment."

"Yes," says Leela, sounding a bit dazed herself, but dutifully following to take Romana's other arm. "Let us go, Romana."

The instant the women are gone, Brax stalks across the room to where Delox stands by his bank of controls. Brax grasps the other Time Lord by the arm. "A moment of your time, Delox," he says, softly.

"Of course, Chancellor."

"Minister," Brax says, his voice hard but absolutely, deadly calm, "I'm not remotely certain what you think you were doing just then. I suspect you had some notion of protecting your own hide, but I frankly I don't care why. All I care about is this: you will _never_ put the President in that kind of situation again. It's her job to make the hard decisions, and she does, as you've just seen. But she is only one woman, and any one of us can only carry so much. So when you're facing a choice that's a very easy one for you and a supremely difficult one for her, you will not cower like a worm because you think she might be _angry_ with you for doing what needs to be done. You will do what is necessary to win this war, _without_ forcing Romana to bear responsibilities that should be yours, or I will _shoot you in the hearts_ as a traitor to Gallifrey, and lose not one moment of sleep about it. Do you understand me?"

Delox is too terrified to speak. He only nods, frantically. Brax releases his arm, and stalks furiously away, past the staring rows of technicians, and out of the control room.

*

"We'd come to that conclusion spans ago, command," Narvin snaps at the crackling communicator that relays his orders. "My troops already have orders to defend that pass with their lives. They'll stop the Daleks or die trying, and I'll join them as soon as I can get this _damned_ barrier to lower." He gives the control unit he's struggling with a hearty kick, and then he's back with his hands full of wiring, frantically trying to convince the thing to respond. "Once I do get the transduction barriers down, can I expect any help on the other end, or is your function limited to handing down dubious pearls of military wisdom?"

"There is a strike force of three hundred thousand Gallifreyan and Phaidon troops waiting for the barriers to drop, Commander, and a thousand fully armed battle TARDISes on alert."

"Good," Narvin says, curtly. He wheels at the sound of laser fire behind him, and he and Garrick swiftly dispatch the pair of Daleks edging up on their position. "Now shut up and let me work, command," says Narvin, turning calmly back to his controls. "And hand me that biharmonic multiplex inverter, Garrick."

"Sir," says Garrick, setting the communicator beside them and handing Narvin the tool he's asked for, "why don't we just destroy this generator? That would bring the transduction barrier down, wouldn't it?"

"We'd be left with no shielding at all for the foreseeable future if we did that, but that's not the main problem. Transduction barriers are dangerous, Adjutant. I've seen one expand and take out an entire fleet. It we simply destroyed this one, it would do the opposite: implode, and suck the entire planet in along with it, leaving nothing more than a fragment of supercompacted matter not unlike a black hole. Is that the fate you'd prefer?"

"Better than letting the Daleks take Arcadia," says Garrick. "If they acquire TARDIS technology..."

"We're not going to let them take the planet, and neither are we going to end our lives compacted into nothingness. If I can just... Ha!" cries Narvin, in triumph. "I think...yes, that's done it. The transduction barriers are down! Do you copy, command?"

"We copy, Commander. Well done. Reinforcements should be arriving any nanospan. You'll soon have sufficient numbers to completely overwhelm the remaining Dalek force. Regroup your troops, and try to hold things together until they arrive."

"Affirmative, command. I'll..."

"Get down, sir!"

There are two laser blasts, almost simultaneous. One of them blows the top off of the Dalek that has just edged up behind them.

"Good...shot, Garrick," says Narvin. He's not sure why it sounds faint to his own ears. Something hard happens, and it's the ground, rushing up to meet him.

"Sir!" Adjutant Garrick's face is hovering distractingly, just above Narvin's, drifting in and out of focus.

"Ah," says Narvin, shakily. "I seem to...oh..."

The blackness curls in on him, and drags him under long before he can remember the end of his sentence.


	7. Keeper of the Presidential Moods

Leela watches Romana very carefully all that day. It is the first time she has thought of herself as truly watching through these things that are not really eyes, she realizes later, but that day she watches, because that is what Romana needs her to do. Leela watches as the reports come streaming in to Romana's office, troop movements and battle updates, and because Leela has learned the way these Time Lords think of war, learned the complicated words like 'casualties' and 'collateral damage' that Leela knows now are just another way to lie about death, she understands as well as Romana does what is happening on Arcadia. Better, perhaps, because Leela is a warrior, even if she is not a Time Lord. She sees the change on Arcadia when the transduction barriers go down, and watches as the surge of Time Lord reinforcements sweep the Dalek force away. She knows when the Daleks are defeated, and knows that the Dalek force on Arcadia will be destroyed ruthlessly, without mercy, and thinks that this is good, and how war ought to be. She only wishes she could be there on the field of battle, where she truly belongs—but Romana needs her here, and so she watches Romana.

Romana is herself, all day. She is strong and iron-willed, and bends to no man. She is as brilliant as Leela has ever seen her, and Leela is proud of the fine general she is becoming. But she sees, too, that Romana is very pale, and that, when she thinks no one is looking, Romana's mouth goes thin, and her fingers tighten. It only ever lasts a moment, and then Romana puts up her chin and keeps on fighting, but it happens again and again as the day goes on. And when the battle is really over, well and truly won, Leela knows what she needs to do.

"Romana," she says, pulling Romana away from a conference (this is what Time Lords call talking, Leela has learned) with one of her Cardinals, "you are coming to the TARDIS bay with me."

"I can't, Leela. Not now."

"You can and you will. The battle is over, Romana. It has been a very important battle, has it not?"

"Yes," Romana admits. "The most important of all the War so far, they tell me."

"And you have won a great victory, yes?"

"Yes," says Romana, again.

"For the people, this is a time to stop and give thanks?"

"There are fireworks already, and I hear worrying rumors of a parade planned for tomorrow. A very sedate and pompous parade, I don't doubt, but the very notion is still alarming. The Daleks expected to take Arcadia by surprise; this was a terrible rout for them, and a wonderful reversal for us. And while we may have a new enemy, we'll also have any number of new allies to fight against them. We've already been approached by representatives of half-a-dozen races who are enemies of the Daleks, and think they'll have a better chance against them with the Time Lords on their side. Whatever plans the Daleks may have had, they'll certainly be adjusting them now."

"Then it is right that your people should celebrate—and when it is a time for celebration among the people, it is a time for rest among their leaders," says Leela. "You know that I am right."

"I don't think I'll be likely to get any rest in the TARDIS bay, Leela."

"No," says Leela, "but you will not get any rest at all if you do not come there first. This piece of paper," Leela waves it in Romana's direction, "says that, of one thousand, five hundred troops in the Twenty-Third company, sixty-one of them are still alive. It says that those sixty-one are being sent back to Gallifrey, now that the trans-duction barriers are open again, so they can rest before they are sent to new companies. And it says that they will arrive in the TARDIS bay in ten microspans. But it does not say the names of the warriors who are living, and those who are dead. And you will not have any peace until you know that."

Romana's hand is shaking under Leela's arm, but her jaw sets. "I don't see why I should care about the Twenty-Third above any other company of my troops, Leela," she says, stubborn.

"The longer you do not know, the longer you will suffer," says Leela, sternly.

"I'm not suffering," Romana insists. "I don't give a damn whether..."

"Romana," Leela snaps, "do you not remember that I once buried a husband I had been fighting with before he died? _Stop pretending_." Romana, shocked, has frozen. "You are too old and too wise to behave like a stupid girl. You are _not_ stupid, and you are not a coward. If Narvin has fallen, he will have died a good death, a warrior's death. You will mourn, but you will mourn proudly, and you will go on fighting."

There is no color at all in Romana's face. She swallows. "He isn't dead," she says, her voice small. "He _isn't_."

"You must know," says Leela, gentle now. She takes both of Romana's hands. "Come, Romana."

Romana bites her lip, and nods. "Castellan Wynter," Romana calls, and the Time Lord rushes to her side. "Is everything under control here?"

"It appears so for the moment, Madam President."

She nods. "I'll be in early tomorrow morning, Castellan. I don't wish to be disturbed unless it's exceptionally important."

"Yes ma'am," he salutes.

Romana holds Leela's hand all the way to the TARDIS bay, and does not care who is watching.

*

Romana doesn't often wish she could be nobody. Right now, all she wants to do is sit beside Leela on the bench on the other side of the TARDIS bay and watch the sixty-one remaining Time Lords and Time Ladies of the Twenty-Third company as they stumble wearily from the transport TARDIS that has carried them here, urgently studying each face for a familiar set of features. But Romana is the President of Gallifrey. She cannot sit in quiet anonymity. She has duties. And so she leaves Leela outside, guarding the TARDIS bay, and positions herself by the TARDIS door to shake the hands of the soldiers as they depart, and thank them for their bravery.

None of the first thirty is Narvin, and each face that isn't his increases Romana's heart-rates. None of the next ten hands she shakes are ones that have slid reverently over her skin; none of the ten soldiers after that has a body she knows every inch of. As she speaks to the next ten, her voice is hoarse, her hand shaking, but her gaze is steady, and it doesn't reassure her. And then the sixty-first Time Lord steps from the transport TARDIS.

She's never seen his face before in all her lives.

Romana closes her eyes. She isn't sure she can breathe. But she can survive these few moments. She can make it as far as her own rooms. She can, because she has to. She can force herself not to understand the truth, until she is alone. She can force herself not to realize that Narvin isn't ever coming back, and that it's _her_ fault, that _she_ sent him to die, and that he drew his last breath thinking she hated him. For only five microspans, she can deceive herself. Just as long as it takes to be the Lady President for the Commander standing in front of her, and then she can let Leela lead her home, and then she can let herself process the idea that...but she can't think about that yet.

She opens her eyes again. Her jaw feels very tight. Somewhere inside her, she's got the right words, though she doesn't know how they make it as far as her mouth. "The bravery of your men was crucial to our victory today, Commander," she says, in a voice that sounds distant to her own ears. "The sacrifice you made today will never be forgotten."

"Thank you, Madam President."

He'll leave, now, and all she has to do is hold out that long. That's all. Just until she's alone, and can be Romana instead of the Madam President. That's all she needs. Except that the soldier in front of her isn't going anywhere, no matter how much she wishes.

"Commander," she says, finally, her eyes somewhere near his collar, "I don't mean to sound ungrateful, but I would appreciate it very much if you would...would leave."

He still doesn't move. "Really?" he asks. "Is that _really_ all? I'm not sure I expected a warm welcome, my Lady, but you might at least not look at me like you wish I'd died after all."

She's startled into glaring up at him, gasping with incredulity. "I'm not certain who you think you are, soldier," she snaps, "but..."

And then she freezes, as something occurs to her.

Her eyes go wide, and she finds herself frantically studying the Time Lord just before her. She hasn't ever seen him before, that much is true. He has sleek chestnut hair and muddy green eyes and something suspiciously like dimples in his cheeks, and none of those descriptors fits the Narvin she knew. But he's looking down at her from almost exactly the same height she remembers, no more than an inch taller than Narvin, and there _is_ something familiar in the drawl of that voice, and the way he's looking at her is...

No. She must be wrong. She _must_ be wrong. She's stupid and giddy with grief, and it's making her hope for the impossible.

Unable to help herself, she lifts a hand, and rests it on his chest, just beside one of his hearts. And then she draws in a sharp breath, because the artron signature humming through the touch is absolutely unmistakable.

She looks back up into his eyes, which are suddenly warm. "Romanadvoratrelundar," he says, softly, "you are the only President in the history of Gallifrey who could possibly forget that Time Lords regenerate."

*

Either it's a trick of his new eyes, or he's forgotten how beautiful she is.

She _shouldn't_ be beautiful. She's staring up at him, eyes wide as saucers, mouth open in shock. She's in unflattering, businesslike robes, and has enormous dark circles beneath her eyes, and she's very pale. But she _is_ beautiful, and she's touching him, and Rassilon, how he's missed her.

He knows what he expects from her. This shock will wear off in a moment. She'll wipe the look of diselief from her face. And then she'll say something sarcastic and pointed, and either it will mean that he's forgiven, or it won't. He doesn't know which just yet, but he'll figure it out once she's said it. That's how this scene is scripted, he's sure.

He's completely unprepared for her face to crumple like a piece of paper in a clenching fist as she topples against his chest and begins bawling unabashedly, great wracking sobs that shake her entire body, uncontrollable as a restless sea.

It's an absolutely unprecedented development, and he has no idea _what_ to do about it. He tries putting his hands on her back, nervously stroking, but she's crying so violently that he supposes she can hardly feel it. He rests his head against hers, but she keeps hiccuping upwards and jostling his teeth against each other in a way that makes his jaw ache. And so he tries a tentative, "Romana?"

She doesn't react, just keeps on sobbing, making strange whimpering noises at impossibly high pitch. Still, he hasn't actually _hurt_ anything, so he tries again. "Romana, it's all right. It's all right, I...ow!"

Her closed fist slamming into his chest with vicious force wasn't precisely the reaction he was hoping for. On the other hand, she has stopped sobbing. She's still crying, though, tears still leaking from her eyes as she leans back and glares up at him—and then she winds up, and hits him again.

"Ow!" he repeats. "Romana..."

"You _bastard_ ," she hisses, and then another sob shakes through her. Her jaw quivers, and she blinks furiously, and thumps her fist against his chest again. "You stupid, selfish _prat_ ," and she's sobbing against his chest again, even as she speaks, and striking out wildly with her fists, " _how_ could you do that to me, how _could_ you go off and do something like that, how could you _force_ me to give that order? I almost had to _kill you_ , Narvin, you utter _bastard_! You almost made me let you _die_ , and it would have been _my fault_ , and _how_ could you do that to me, how could you _do that_ to me when _I love you_ , you _bastard_ , you absolute..."

She tries to keep berating him all through the first kiss. She doesn't wrap her arms around his neck and pull him in deeper until the third. He's stopped counting before the last of her tears dries on her cheek. And none of those factors diminishes any of it in the slightest.

It feels like an instant, but is probably a good while later when the door to the TARDIS bay slides open. Narvin doesn't bother opening his eyes, much less discontinuing his basial activities.

"Narvin!" cries Leela's voice, delighted. "Well... I certainly hope you are Narvin. He _is_ Narvin, is he not, Romana?"

"'lo Savage," Narvin manages to mumble, though most of it disappears into Romana's mouth.

Leela laughs. "Hello, Soldier Boy. I am glad that you are not dead. There, Romana, did I not tell you to come and see for yourself?"

Romana doesn't answer. As the question wasn't addressed to him, Narvin feels no compulsion to attempt a response himself.

"Romana," says Leela, concerned, "this is all very good, but should you not perhaps go somewhere private? Anyone might come here." There is still no answer. "You always worry so about the 'dignity of your office.' That means that no one is supposed to see you with your tongue in Narvin's mouth, is it not so?"

Narvin isn't sure whether Romana tries to nod, or whether she's just aiming for a better angle. Leela gives an annoyed growl. "Only just stop for long enough for me to es-cort you both to your rooms, Romana, and then you may go on kissing him for as long as you like."

Narvin thinks he might have managed to give some kind of answer to that one, if Romana hadn't chosen that moment to drag a fingertip along the back of his neck, just below his hairline, to which of course the only rational response had been pulling her in closer, holding her just the way she likes best, one hand on the small of her back and the other between her shoulder blades. Anyway, of the two of them, _he's_ the one not yet eight spans regenerated, his whole body still gloriously oversensitive and untried. If one of them has to be sensible just now, it shouldn't have to be _him_...

"Ow!" Romana and Narvin screech, in unison, stumbling away from each other as they nurse their aching heads, each tugging one of Leela's hands out of their hair.

"Oh, I am sorry," says Leela, in her best false singsong 'I am an innocent savage' voice. "Is that not a custom of your people? Among the Sevateem, we have a tradition of knocking our warriors' heads together when they are being _stupid_. Have you not thought that if you will only behave yourselves for long enough to walk down a few corridors, you can go on with your kissing without so many clothes on?"

"Leela," says Romana, aghast, "you would interrupt that touching reunion with such a sordid suggestion?" Leela raises her eyebrows. Romana nods. "You're a genius," she proclaims. "Isn't she a genius, Narvin?"

"You're a genius, Savage," he agrees.

"And you are silly," sighs Leela. "What you would do without me I do not know."

"May we never have to find out," declares Romana, and pecks Leela on the cheek.

"Do not start kissing _me_ , or we shall never get out of here."

"Lead on then, Leela," Narvin pronounces.

"I will walk between you," Leela decides. "It will be less dangerous that way."

"You make it sound as though we were a pair of Daleks," Narvin says, as they're all stepping out into the corridor.

Romana suddenly begins to giggle wildly. "What is so funny?" Leela asks.

"Make love, not Time War. We should make posters."

Romana is met with a pair of uncomprehending looks. "Never mind," she says, still giggling to herself. "I'll tell the Doctor later. _He'll_ laugh. And then I'll demote him. He'll like that even better."

"Demote him, Madam President?" asks Narvin, innocently.

"If you think for one moment that I am _ever_ going to permit a repeat of this afternoon, Coordinator Narvin, you are sadly mistaken."

" _Coordinator_ Narvin?"

"I am clearly emotionally compromised where you are concerned. It doesn't make sound military sense for you to be out there under my direct orders, interfering with my objectivity as a commander. And anyway, I need a man I can trust behind the desk of the CIA, one who doesn't make a hobby of convincing me to behave like a rebellious girl. I don't care whether you want the position back or not, I'm pressganging you into it. I order you to accept. I'll...I'll charge you with treason if you disobey. And have you imprisoned. Permanently. In my personal quarters."

"That's the most appealing threat I've ever heard. And you might just have said please," he points out, hiding a smile in an intentionally ineffectual sort of way.

"Later, perhaps," she grins wickedly. "And _not_ in public."

"I'll look forward to that, Madam President."

Leela rolls her eyes. "Spirits save me from Time Lords and their madness. All those people who say you are a cold race would not believe the life I lead."

"Congratulations, Leela," says Romana, squeezing Leela's arm where it is linked through hers. "You've discovered the greatest secret in the known universe: Time Lords aren't quite as asexual as everyone seems to think."

"I knew _that_ ," scoffs Leela. "I am married to one of you, Romana."

"So you are," Romana smiles. "And as someone very wise once told me, when it is a time for celebration among the people, it is a time for rest among their leaders. As soon as you've got me safely behind closed doors—I would say that Narvin is perfectly capable of acting as my honor guard for this last leg, but I know you'd never surrender your post—I'm sending you home to your husband." She grins. "If you get to stage-manage _my_ love life, I don't see why I shouldn't have the same privilege."

"You are in charge of too many things already, Madam President. I can see to my own marriage, thank you."

"Oh, forgive me. In that case, I don't mind a bit if you'd like a spot of guard duty tonight. Do feel free to stand around in front of my door and be bored all night long."

"You are a hard woman, Romana," says Leela, shaking her head sadly. They have reached the main doors of the Presidential Complex by now, and head arm in arm across the enormous marble foyer in the direction of the lifts.

"This is what war has made of me," Romana agrees, with mock sadness. "Saddling my dearest friend with the terrible choice between spending the evening in bed with her husband, or staring at a wall for twelve spans. What _has_ become of my vaunted compassion."

"I don't think it's war that's been the problem," Narvin interjects. The door to the lift has closed behind them, leaving only the three of them inside, and, now that there's no one but Leela around to see, Narvin catches Romana around the waist. Pulling her close, her back to his front, he brushes his lips over her ear. "You haven't had me around recently." He raises his head and grins up at Leela. "She'll be in a much better mood tomorrow, Leela, I promise."

"You are the most important man in the government, Narvin," Leela laughs. "Keeper of the Presidential Moods. They should give you a new title."

"Do you know, I've been considering something very much like that," says Romana, cheerily.

That statement takes a moment to register with both Leela and Narvin, and they both turn to look at Romana. Before either of them can say anything, the door of the lift opens on the seventy-first floor. Romana strides briskly out, still smiling, tugging Narvin by the hand.

"Romana..." he starts to ask, but then they're passing through her bustling outer office. It's changed dramatically since last he saw it, and it's busier than he's ever seen it before, Time Lords and Ladies everywhere. He recognizes hardly any of them, but just before the door that leads to Romana's inner office and personal quarters stands a familiar face.

"Braxiatel!" calls Narvin, more genially than he thinks he's ever spoken that name before. "Proof that the Daleks really are ugly beggars—I think I'm actually pleased to see your face."

Braxiatel looks up, frowns minutely for an instant, and then understands. "Ah, it's you, Narvin," says Brax. "And here for a moment I hoped you might have been...anyone else. Battlefield regenerations may not give a man much time to be discerning, but I do wish you'd managed to at least do better than last time. Some of us have senses of aesthetics."

"Yes, I'm glad I survived the battle, too. Thank you for those kind good wishes."

"Play nicely, boys," says Romana. "Leela, do you trust me to get through this last door all by myself?"

While Romana and Leela are bidding their goodbyes, Braxiatel catches Narvin by the arm.

"As a matter of fact, I _am_ glad you lived," says Brax, too softly for anyone else to hear. "She would never have been the same."

Narvin studies Brax's face. "Did you just give me your _blessing_ , Braxiatel?"

"Make her happy," says Brax, already slipping away, "or I will most assuredly make _you_ miserable. Good evening, Madam President," he finishes, much more loudly, as he's heading for the door.

"Goodnight, Brax," she says. "And you, Leela."

"Goodnight, Madam President. Goodnight, Narvin."

"Goodnight, Savage."

From there, it's only a few steps, and then he and Romana are safe in her private quarters, shut away from the rest of the world.

He hasn't thought about coming home, not in those terms. He thought about getting off the battlefield, and he thought about seeing Romana again, but he's not quite registered what it means, being back on Gallifrey. It's just hitting him, this moment, now, here, that he's really back. His life is about to go back to what it used to be, as it used to be. He lived in the Citadel for six hundred and thirty-eight years, and off-world for just one, and somehow coming home is what feels like a dream. And Romana says he's going to stay. He's going to stay here, back where he belongs.

He'd have thought that coming home would be an untempered relief. A week ago, it probably would have been. In spite of everything, however, he cannot deny that he has found this last day at war to be, in some strange sense, a deeply enjoyable experience. Battle may be anything but glamorous—ugly, costly, and liable to send a man home in pieces—but he cannot deny that it has its intoxicating edge. Under other circumstances, he might actually want to go back to Arcadia, to be the man to re-build the Twenty-Third Company and lead it through this war. But as it is, life in the Citadel has one very definite attraction that Arcadia could never boast, and he happens at this moment to be looking straight at her.

Romana has been studying him as he looked around the room, standing just out of his reach. One long step—his stride is slightly longer, now, that'll take some getting used to—and they're face to face, and she's staring up at him, not touching.

"I suppose this is the bit where we're supposed to be awkward," he says. "Not quite sure what to do with each other. Possibly one of us is meant to say something like 'we have a lot to talk about.'"

"I believe that is the usual procedure in these situations," she agrees.

"Romana?" he asks, sliding his arms around her waist.

"Hmmm?" she says, letting him pull her close.

"Can we skip that part?"

She smiles, his favorite of her smiles, her whole face coming alive with it, and he remembers with that smile that they're still young, for everything they've seen.

*

Romana doesn't say anything at all. It doesn't seem necessary, really. She just presses up into a kiss, and keeps on kissing him all the while he marches them to her bedroom: short kisses and long kisses, close-mouthed and open, tentative and eager, breathless and gasping. And then the backs of her knees are bumping against the edge of her bed, and in a moment he's on top of her.

It almost helps, that he's regenerated. It would feel strange no matter what, a little, this first time in his new body, and so it can't feel strange just because he's been away. She can't spend her time realizing that there are things that she's forgotten about him in a year apart, because they aren't there for her to remember. There might be something sad about the fact that she'll never be able to re-learn him, about the fact that the past is gone forever, except that she hasn't got emotional space enough to feel sad right now. She's too full up with everything else there is to feel: happiness, mostly, and curiosity, and an unexpected stab of possessiveness at the thought that she'll be his first in this body, that she's claiming him right out of the gate and doesn't ever intend to let anyone else touch him again.

She doesn't ever remember feeling quite that way about him before, and she thinks maybe it's because she thought she'd lost him, _really_ lost him, if only for a few unbearable moments. She _won't_ lose him. She won't let _anyone_ take him away. He belongs to her, and the universe has another thing coming if it thinks she'll let even death have him without her say-so.

"You're distracted," he says, teasingly reproachful, kissing her cheek, her jaw, her ear.

"Only thinking of you," she smiles.

"A very convenient answer."

"See for yourself."

She touches her forehead to his, and the first moment of contact is a mutual searing rush of _ohbloodyhellImissedthis_ as their minds slide each into each. And then she's nudging her train of thought in his direction, just as it occurs to her that possibly mortality isn't the right subject for this particular moment.

 _I just came off of a battlefield. It's exactly the right subject for this particular moment_ , he reassures. "But my Lady President," he continues, leaning around and breaking their contact so he can breathe the words into her ear, "you're developing delusions of grandeur. Even you don't command death."

"I do when it's you," she says, fiercely, suddenly enough that she surprises even herself. "I _do_. So help me, Narvin, if you ever dare to die without my permission, I will kill you myself."

Narvin grins. Brax may not have been entirely stretching with his insults earlier; Narvin's new face isn't strikingly handsome, any more than the last one ever was. But it's impossible to remember that fact when he smiles. This new Narvin seems to have lost all the heaviness his last self carried in his eyes, and even if it is only a matter of the moment, or because he's not yet had time enough in this skin to grow back into his burdens, even if it can't last and there will be times to come when she thinks neither of them will ever smile again, right now it's very, very good. Right now, it's making her remember that there was a time she used to smile like that, and if anyone can bring her smile back, it might just be him.

"Forgive me mentioning it, Madam President," he teases, "but your official policies where I am concerned have been worryingly inconsistent in recent months. If you're going to threaten such dire punishments, I really ought to know where I stand." He interrupts himself for a long kiss that leaves her moaning into his mouth. "I take it that this recent spate of concern for my well-being indicates a reversal of your former position, most eloquently and succinctly stated, if my memory serves me properly, as 'I hope you choke?'"

"I _never_ told you I hoped you choked."

He's moving his hips in slow, lazy circles, grinding against her, as his hands slide deliberately over her body. Every now and then he undoes another button of her robes, but only ever one at a time, maddeningly casual.

"No. But you told Leela you hoped I choked, and she passed the message along one of the many times you refused to take my calls."

She doesn't specifically remember the occasion, but she has to admit that it's quite probably true. "I no longer hope you choke."

"And are you quite sure you're resigned to the prospect of looking at me? I seem to recall words to the effect that any and all faces of mine would be unwelcome in your sight forevermore."

"I'm fairly certain I only ever referenced the one face." He has uncovered her collarbone now, and runs his tongue along it. "And even if you still had the old one, I think I would have revised my opinions somewhat."

"I might not be going too far in stating that there are, as of this moment, other Time Lords in the universe of whom you harbor lower opinions than of me?"

She runs a hand through his hair. "I can think of one or two."

"And might it even," he kisses the hollow of her throat, "be possible," and then an inch up her neck, "that you missed me?" He brushes upwards, leaving off with their noses touching.

"I'm not certain I'd go _that_ far."

"Wouldn't you?"

"It's not _impossible_."

"Isn't it?"

She bites her lip. Then she tugs her arm free of him, and pulls open the drawer of her nightstand.

It's bigger on the inside. It has to be. There would never have been room for fifty-four letters in it otherwise, not to mention some dozens of unsent notes and scraps and missives in reply.

"Does that answer your question?"

He stares for a moment at the pages and pages, swirling and swooping in his own hand. He laughs, and she knows it's because he's caught sight of some wry comment she's jotted in a margin, or some observation she noted down on whatever bit of paper was handy, because she couldn't tell him and was aching to. "Yes," he says, as he turns back to her. "But tell me anyway."

She bites her lip, and a wicked smile steals its way over her face. "No," she says, coyly, sliding one leg up so that her knee brushes along the inner edge of his thigh. She's not used to him in shirt and trousers—robes, of course, are too impractical for a battlefield. This new attire does make for less tangling up in unnecessary fabric, but on the other hand there is a certain loss in ease of access. "I don't think I will."

He catches on immediately. Even when she didn't like him, she could never deny that he was clever. "Won't you, then?" he asks, coolly.

She shakes her head. "I don't think you..." Her breath hisses as he bites the crook of her neck—not punishing or painful, just right. "...deserve it," she gasps. His hands are at work in earnest on her buttons, now, nothing meandering this time, and she's untucking his shirt before she knows it's what she means to do.

"Oh, naturally not. I've only spent the past year fighting for my planet, laying my life on the line in your service, with only memories and an empty bed for company." He rolls them onto their sides, shoving her robes aside as he goes. "Not nearly enough to earn a man the benefit of one simple comment." He eyes her up and down, a long, claiming glance, and tightens his arms, pinning her close to him. "Tell me you missed me, Romana."

"Won't," she says, and he kisses her, hard, stealing her breath, crushing her to him. And then his mouth is on her neck, her shoulders, scraping teeth and hands on her naked skin, and she's torn between loving how clothed he is by contrast, and wanting his skin, too. It's curiosity as much as lust that returns her hands to tugging and unbuttoning. He's a whole new man, and it isn't right, that she doesn't know him yet.

"Romana," he says, biting her shoulder, palming her breast, running a hand along her thigh. "Say it, Romana. Tell me you thought of me."

"Why would I?" She's just managed to get his shirt unbuttoned when he rolls her over onto her other side so she's facing away from him. He slides an arm around her waist to splay wide-fingered over her stomach, and then brushes her hair aside so he can press his mouth to the back of her neck. Even for a Gallifreyan she is exceptionally sensitive here, and is left hissing, arching back against him.

"Because I want you to," he murmurs against her skin. "Because I need to hear it. Because it's true. You wanted me, Romana. You dreamed about me, when you could fall asleep at all without me here. Tell me you missed me. Say the words."

Undoing his belt while he's behind her, when she can't see and her arms are at a strange, impractical angle and half-pinned by his and she can barely breathe for the glorious, mad loveliness of his mouth on her neck, the way he occasionally leans forward to lick at her ear, is a frankly mad prospect. Still, she's done madder things, and more difficult. And if perhaps her fingers occasionally slip, and end up brushing lower than his beltline, well, that's just fine. But she can hardly be expected to do all that and talk at the same time. Especially not when he dips his head, and scrapes his teeth along her shoulderblade.

She does verbalize _something_ then. It just isn't any word in any language she speaks. She's got his belt unbuckled now, and gives up her scrabbling for a moment to grab at his hand on her stomach, slide it downwards in unmistakable instruction. He tugs his hand away, however, and brings it up to her lips instead. She takes his index and middle fingers into her mouth, laving and sucking as his own mouth keeps on moving along her neck and back and shoulders. His hands taste like metal and ozone and blood, like the war he's just come from, and she thinks she shouldn't like that as much as she does.

Before she's had nearly enough of the taste of him, he's pulling his fingers from her mouth. She doesn't have even time enough to mourn the loss before those same slick fingers are pressing between her thighs and up into her, just as he bites into the place where her shoulder meets her neck, and she's whimpering, and pressing against him every way she knows how.

"You missed this, Romana." His lips are on her ear, his fingers moving slowly, teasing. "You missed _me_. You are going to tell me so."

"Take off your...mmmm, I... _Narvin_..."

He's sucking her earlobe into his mouth, and both of them are scrabbling at his trouser buttons with their free hands, and he's pressing harder into her, his fingers wriggling and thrusting. She wants him in her head, and in her body, and _now_.

Loath to surrender his fingers inside her, she's careful as she rolls onto her back, freeing her arms to shove down his trousers from a practically reasonable angle.

"Narvin," she mentions, "you're still wearing your boots."

"Tell me you missed me," he grins, and presses up with his fingers, making her hips buck as she gasps, "and I'll take them off."

"You're...absurd."

"Mmmm," he agrees, and then he's kissing her breast, tongue batting back and forth over a nipple, his teeth scraping with exquisite delicacy.

"And stubborn," she mentions. "Sneaky. Devious. Narrow...minded. Why...why would I miss..."

"Because you need me," he says, glancing up at her.

"I don't _need_ anyone."

His expression clouds, completely and instantly. Pulling his fingers from her, leaning up, he braces his hands to either side of her head as he balances above her, deadly serious.

"Yes you do," he says. " _Yes_ you do. So help me, Romana, I'll walk right back out that door if you haven't learned _anything_ from all of this."

She sits up, suddenly, her eyes widening, knocking him backwards. "If _I_ haven't learned! _You_ were the one who..."

"No." He sits back on his heels. "No, I really wasn't. _Damn_ it, I thought you'd... But of course not." He scrubs a hand through his hair. "Apparently we do have to have that discussion after all."

It's all such a sudden change of pace that she's left blinking, and feeling suddenly very, very naked. "All right," she says, too caught off-guard to argue. "But take the boots off, Narvin."

He smiles, genuine and at the same time a little ironic, and it makes things better, and worse. "Yes, my Lady," he says. It's affectionate, and a little distant, and it frightens her more than she cares to admit.

There is a long silence as he fiddles with laces, and then he's sitting beside her, their backs against the headboard.

"Well?" she asks, more snappish than she planned. "You said you wanted to talk. Start talking."

*

He's faced down an army of Daleks today. His nerves are far more strained now than they were then. But he can't do this again. He can't ever go through this again, another separation, another miniature lifetime spent wondering if he'll ever get her back, and this _will_ come up again, if he doesn't say it now. This conversation is absolutely necessary—but that is very far from making it easy.

"Romana," he says, "I don't pretend that it was the best possible course on my part, proposing the bill that started the war. I won't deny that I should have handled it better. In particular, I shouldn't have gone behind your back about it, but you have to understand why I did."

"I _have_ to?"

" _Yes_." She's surprised by his insistence, left blinking at him. He wants so badly to kiss her, and he can't, not yet. "Romanadvoratrelundar, you cannot be President all by yourself. You can't be a _person_ all by yourself, and a President even less." Her eyes are narrowing. "You have the right tools already. Braxiatel, and Leela, and the Doctor, and me—you've surrounded yourself by people who care about you, who are loyal to you, and who aren't afraid to tell you when you're wrong. That's a wonderful combination. It's the _right_ combination for Presidential advisers. But the next step is listening to us, _using_ us, or else what's the point?"

"You don't think I work you all hard enough?" she asks, quirking an eyebrow. "That's a refreshing perspective."

"In some ways you do," he admits. "You trust our competence. You trust our loyalty. But you don't trust our judgement. Romana, every single one of your friends saw that this war was coming. We _all_ told you that the time for talking was past, and that there were things you needed to be doing, for the safety of Gallifrey. I tried over and over to get through to you before I went over your head, you can't possibly deny that."

"So the fact that I disagreed with you makes it all my fault?" Her mouth is a tight line, and he knows she'll go on if he lets her. He rushes back into the breach, as quickly as he's able.

"It's not a matter of fault, but Romana, you aren't infallible. You know that I trust your judgment. You know I'm willing to act against my own inclination, my own instinct, in your service. You are my President, and I will follow where you lead. But trust isn't one-way, and neither is leadership. And sometimes, you _have_ to let yourself trust someone else. You have to admit that you can't do _everything_ yourself. You're stronger and more brilliant than anyone I've ever known, but that doesn't mean you don't need people."

"I'm the President, Narvin," she says, without heat. "My judgment is all I have. And I can't _need_ anybody."

"You need people _more_ because you're President! Romana, why can't..." He rubs the heel of his hand against his forehead, and tries again. "You're a Time Lady, Romana. A living, breathing person. And you've been chosen to carry something that no one person possibly ever could. Of _course_ you need people. You're not all-powerful, you're not perfect, and that's _all right_. Don't you see that? You're not some kind of...of other-being. You shouldn't be. You couldn't be! You can't be right every time, you can't do everything by yourself, you _need people_. And you have people, and we're the right people." He grasps her by the shoulders. " _That_ is the choice that makes a President. Not how much of the burden they can carry singlehanded: who they choose to share it with." He laughs. "That's not even Presidency, it's _life_. None of us can carry our lives alone. I need you, Romana, and I'm not ashamed to say it. But I need to know that you want me to share your life too, or what's the point in me hanging around any more?"

She isn't looking at him any more, her eyes very far away, lost in thought. Gently, he slides his thumb beneath her chin, and tilts it up so her eyes meet his. "I missed you, Romana," he says, softly. "Did you miss me?"

For a long time, she studies him, silent, her eyes scanning his face like a book, trying to read every last secret in him. And then her lips part, and her eyes unfocus again, and he knows she's reading herself instead, now. He sits in silence, and tries to fight the panic coiling in his stomach and hammering in his hearts.

Finally, she looks back at him. Slowly, slowly, she slides her body forwards, leaning herself against him, tucking herself against his chest, so that his chin rests on her forehead. She grasps his hands, and pulls his arms around her.

"Narvin," she says. "Not long before you met me...you know that I was...captured. By the Daleks."

She _never_ talks about that. Not once has he ever heard her mention it before. But of course he knows; no one on Gallifrey, much less a CIA operative, could possibly have helped noticing that their President had vanished for two decades. "Yes," he says, as noncommittally as he can.

"I was...I was held as a prisoner of war. A slave. For twenty years. Alone, no one else to depend on, and with no control over anything that happened to me. And now...now I don't like giving up control. And I'm not very comfortable with needing people." She looks up at him. "And I absolutely _hate_ wars."

He has no idea what to say. "Don't try," she advises, just a little sharply, before he can. "I don't want _sympathy_ , and you're...you're right, Narvin. I know you are. I know you're right, I _know_ I couldn't have stopped this war. I do trust you, all of you, but I should show it, better than I do, and I will try. And I...I do need..." She hesitates, and then smiles softly to herself. Twisting in his embrace, she perches herself above him, mostly in his lap, her arms around his neck, their faces hovering at a level. "I missed you," she says, "every single day."

He slides a hand into her hair, brushing it back from her face, and leans his forehead against hers. Their minds just brush together, not quite proper contact yet. "I'm very glad to hear it."

"I hope you understand that I'll not have you treating me like...like I'm different, somehow," she mentions, sounding much more like herself.

"I know that," he says, smiling.

"I _am_ still your President, Narvin."

"Always that, my Lady."

"I still give the orders around here."

"Of course." He grins. "Did you have any specific orders in mind, Madam President?"

"I think I'm going to have to insist that you kiss..."

He does, and laughs against her lips, relief and joy mingling in his hearts and tracing their way through his veins. It's going to be all right. It really is. There may still be a war on, but that's no trouble. They've won wars before together, the two of them, battles small and large, and they'll do it again. And for tonight, he has the President of Gallifrey all to himself, and she is just his Romana, and it's been a year since they've touched each other, and they're in a very large and very comfortable bed without a single article of clothing anywhere between the two of them, and, just at this moment, they understand each other, and what they need, and what they are.

This will be far from the only long night of the war for either of them, Narvin thinks, as he wraps his hands around her hips and runs his thumbs over her stomach, but if he has any say in things, this one will be the longest, and the best.

*

"Narvin?"

"Hmmm?"

He's flat on his back on the floor, most of Romana's sheets underneath him. He thinks the covers left the bed before they did, but he's not entirely certain on that point; he'd had other things on his mind at the time. The thought has occurred to him that perhaps he, Romana, the linens or all of the above would be better off back on the bed, but he's not nearly uncomfortable enough for that thought to make anything but a fleeting impression. He's also considered the possibility of light, but his eyes have long since adjusted to the darkness, and the moons are bright tonight through the long windows on the other side of the room, and Romana's skin in the moonlight has a color that painters would kill to capture, and probably have done.

A moment ago she was lying beside him, similarly supine, his arm beneath her neck and his hand on her shoulder. Now she makes a noise indicative of supreme effort, and rolls onto her side, one of her legs draping itself over his thigh, her face colliding gracelessly with his chest.

"Again," she mumbles.

He groans, and manages to wrap his arm around her. "You're not serious."

"Again," she repeats.

"Can you even stand up right now, Romana?"

"Don't have to," she says, kissing his sternum. "Again, Narvin."

"Your hair is an absolute rat's nest, you know. And it's in my face. And it itches."

"Doesn't matter." She rocks back and forth against his side, in a way he supposes is meant to indicate emphasis. " _Again_."

"How many orgasms have you even _had_ tonight?"

"Not nearly enough yet. And you already know the answer to that, you're the sort of man who keeps count of these things."

"I neither confirm nor deny the allegation," he says, tracing his fingertips over her spine, "but it's not entirely impossible that the answer is eleven."

"Not nearly enough," she repeats. "Not to make up for a whole _year_."

"And whose fault precisely was that year of celibacy?"

"Yours," she says, instantly and emphatically. "It's always your fault, Narvin. You should know that. Now, make it up to me."

"You are the most demanding woman in the entire known universe."

She raises her chin, and grins up at him. "Yes," she agrees, "but I _am_ worth it, you know."

He rolls so she's on her back again, he propped up by his elbows on top of her. "Supposing for the moment that I grant that point," he says. "In her infinite mercy, could my Lady President be persuaded to grant a poor mortal five microspans reprieve between one feat of heroism and the next?"

"That depends," she says, her eyes glinting wickedly. "Are you willing to beg?"

He leans in to bite her lower lip, grinning against her mouth as they exchange a few messy kisses. "I think begging is far more usual when the aim is to _encourage_ a sense of urgency. I seem, for example, to recall a very nice variation on 'please, oh, yes, please' from your direction not a span ago."

"You liked that, did you?" she asks, flicking her tongue into the hollow of his throat.

"Mmmm. Very skillfully done, I thought."

"I'll bet you," she nips at his ear, "that you can't make me do it again."

He makes a sound that is half-laugh and half-groan, and collapses on top of her, driving the air from her lungs. "Five microspans, Romana."

She snakes one leg out from beneath him, and drags her heel up the back of his leg. "Three."

"Three," he grants. "Can we migrate to the bed in the meantime?"

"Is this all a diabolical plot to get me to fall asleep, Coordinator? Because I won't, you know."

"I would never presume to imagine that I could out-plot my Lady President," he says, straight-faced.

"Apart from all the many times you've presumed exactly that."

"Apart from then," he agrees, levering himself unsteadily to his feet, and reaching a hand down to her. She takes it, lets him pull her up, and then reaches down herself for the blankets, dragging them back in the direction of the bed. She's not entirely steady on her feet, however, and overbalances, collapsing backwards onto the mattress. She ends up as a sprawled study in asymmetry, blanket and sheet bisecting her, covering one arm, one leg, one breast, hair fanning everywhere. He quirks his head to one side and studies her, holding this image close, to keep him in darker days than these.

"What does that look mean?" she asks. "It was very unfair of you to come back with a new face, Narvin. It may be whole _spans_ before I've got you completely figured out again."

"I could tell you what I was thinking," he says, lifting the other side of the blanket up onto the bed before climbing up himself, "but it was fairly deplorable, really."

"How terribly unflattering."

"No," he says, "quite the opposite. _Too_ flattering. Sickeningly sentimental, if you want to know."

"Tell me."

"You want to be sickened?"

"I promise I'll do a very good job of disguising my disgust."

He pulls the blankets up around them both, and wraps an arm around her waist, lying facing her, both on their sides. "You," he says, smiling, "are incomprehensibly beautiful. I've had to convince myself this past year that my memory was faulty, because it didn't seem possible that you could be as perfect as I remembered."

"And were you?" she asks. "Remembering me right?

"No," he says, kissing her. "The real thing is infinitely better."

"Mmmm, you're right," she says, pressing into another kiss. "Absolutely nauseating."

"I did warn you. I think you'll have to think up something nice to say about me, now, just to even the odds a bit. It's only fair."

"That's a very tall order, Narvin."

"I'm sure a woman of your genius can come up with _something_."

She leans back to study his face. "I had no idea you could write like that," she says, almost shyly.

He very nearly blushes, but manages to stop it in time. "I didn't know I could either," he admits. "It got easier, the longer I went on." He kisses her again, deep and slow and lingering. "Any you particularly liked?" he asks.

She bites her lip. "Well...there were...I didn't entirely mind it when you..."

"Really?" he laughs.

"All of them," she says, smiling, tucking her face into the crook of his neck. "I liked all of them. Except the last. And even that one...I'd rather you were honest, than pretended. It helped, that you didn't ever pretend."

"I don't think I could have," he says. "Not then."

"And today?" she asks, looking up at him. "I haven't asked. Whether you...want to talk about it."

"It wasn't as much of a massacre as it could have been," he says. "If our guns hadn't affected the Daleks, and I'm fairly certain they expected to take us functionally unarmed, we'd have been slaughtered like animals. As it was...we fought. We did what we had to." He looks away, and thinks it's maybe the first time he's intentionally focused on anything but her since the TARDIS bay. "They were my responsibility, my troops, and most of them are dead."

"They were my troops, too," she points out, "and I'm the one who sent you into that situation. You can't blame yourself."

"Why did you do it?" he asks.

"To save lives," she says. "The lives of the other troops on the planet—and the lives of everyone on Gallifrey, maybe the _universe_ , if the Daleks had managed to take Arcadia."

"And did it work?"

"Yes."

"Then you can't blame yourself any more than I can."

"I would fight you about that," she says, "but I'm finding it difficult to feel guilty about anything at all right now."

He smiles and kisses her. "And this?" she asks, laying a hand on his chest once their mouths part. "I don't even know why you had to regenerate."

"Just what you'd expect," he says. "The Daleks have honed their guns for use on Time Lords; we wouldn't have had nearly so many deaths otherwise. The beam from their guns fans out, so that if they hit near enough to the center of the chest, one shot can take out both hearts, kill for good. I had a good man with me, Adjutant Garrick, and he shoved me far enough out of the direct path that I only ended up with a very nice chunk out of my right side, and here I am. I wasn't near enough to him to return the favor, about a span afterwards. The medics aren't sure whether he'll ever wake up."

"I'm sorry," she says, softly.

"I'm not. I'd been in that skin far too long as it was. I needed a change." He knows that's not what she actually meant, but she lets him keep up the pretense, and he's grateful for it. "I've barely had more than a peek at my own face, so far. What do you think?"

"I think I wish I'd been able to say a proper goodbye to your last body, but I wouldn't toss this one out of bed," she says, grinning.

"Well, obviously," he points out.

"Obviously," she agrees, and kisses him, artless and wet and somehow better for that. Then she's pulled back, studying him intently, with an expression of pleased bemusement.

"It's odd," she says. "I wouldn't have thought...with a regeneration under such traumatic circumstances, but you look..."

"What?" he asks.

"Happy," she says, with a little smile. "You look happy."

"I wonder why that could possibly be."

She gives him a full-on grin then, and he knows for certain in that moment that he will never again want to see anything else as much as he does that smile, and that there's really only one thing to be done about it. He had rather hoped he would never find himself in this position, but Romanadvoratrelundar has an infuriating habit of upsetting all his calculations in life. Besides, from something she said earlier, which may or may not have been meant as a hint, it's even possible that she may not laugh in his face.

"Romana," he says, carefully, "I have something to say."

"You generally do."

"It's a fairly long something."

"That's hardly unusual either."

"And on the important side, I like to think."

"That _is_ unusual. Get on with it then, Narvin. Your three microspans are long gone already, and it's nearly first sunrise. I still have plans for you before the day begins."

"I didn't mean to do this," he says. He hadn't thought he was nervous, but the pit of his stomach doesn't seem to agree. "I mean, I hadn't...it isn't that... I certainly didn't mean to do this _now_. Not yet. I know that ten years is nothing. There shouldn't have been any rush, we might have just... But things aren't the same, now. You and I both know that, victory or no victory, this war is far from over, and no matter how relatively safe we may be here, at the center of everything, it could all fall apart in a nanospan. We used to be guaranteed a future, each of us, centuries and centuries of time, and it just isn't the same now. I could so easily have died today, and there are things I would have regretted leaving undone. And so I know that ten years isn't anything, for us, and I know that I'm less than a day out from regeneration and that this is the last moment when I should be making important decisions, and I know that we've only just got past a very major fight and we're still in the afterglow, but there isn't time to wait for some kind of perfect moment, Romana, or some other era of our lives, or..."

"Narvin," she says, wrapping her arms around his neck, her fingers in his hair, "you may not have noticed, but I am a woman of less than limitless patience. Now ask your question, or I'm afraid I'll have to do it for you."

"I didn't mention anything about any question," he says. The tightness in his chest has suddenly become an up-swelling of something that's still nerves, and yet is certainty, too, and a slow grin is spreading across his face without him meaning to.

"Didn't you have something to ask, then?" she asks innocently. "My mistake. You won't mind if I ask you something instead, then."

"Not until after I've had my say."

"But what if I _want_ to be the one to..."

"That's simply too bad," he says. "You get to be in charge of everything else, my Lady President. Let me do this."

"I _would_ ," she says, sliding closer to him, smiling all over her face, "if you would only get on with it."

"I'm trying, but you keep..."

"One more microspan, and I'm asking you instead."

"Are you going to listen, or are you going..."

"Tick-tock, Narvin."

"You are impossible to live with, are you aware of that?"

"If that's your idea of buttering me up..."

"What, do you expect me to lie to you? You _are_ impossible to live with."

She laughs, and kisses him, and nips at his lower lip, and laughs again. "What is it?" he asks.

"You," she says. "Me. Us."

"What about us?"

"How many couples do you suppose could _possibly_ manage to have a fight about who gets to ask the other to marry them?"

Her breath catches a little at the end of that statement, and so does his. "That _is_ what this is about," she says, just a hint uncertain for the first time, "isn't it?"

He nods, slowly. The solemnity of it has caught up with them both, and when she smiles this time, it's in her eyes, not on her lips. "Well," she says, "go on, then."

He swallows, and spares one more moment to wonder how it ever came to this. Surely he used to be a sensible man. Before there was Romana, this wasn't anything he would ever have thought he wanted. Then again, here he is in bed with a woman who is half a universe out of his league in every conceivable way, and who for some reason is willing to tolerate him worshiping the ground she walks on, so long as he doesn't ever phrase it quite that way. Not letting her get away seems quite a reasonable plan, when he puts it like that. He takes a deep breath.

"You may be impossible to live with, Romana," says Narvin, "but living without you is far worse, and I don't ever want to have to do it again. I would rather hear you insult me than listen to any other woman in the universe singing my praises, and that's fortunate for the both of us, since you do enjoy insulting me." He smiles at her. "I want to spend the rest of my lives fighting and making up with you, driving each other completely mad and pushing each other's buttons and disagreeing and having really bloody fantastic sex and getting strange looks from the ninety-five percent of the universe who think the idea of us is ridiculous, and knowing glances from the other five percent who see exactly why we work. I want to watch you with every pair of eyes I ever have, and kiss you with every pair of my lips, and touch you with every pair of my hands, and love you with every pair of my hearts. And if the prospect of all of that doesn't sound _too_ entirely vile, and maybe even a little bit enjoyable, you might consider the possibility of marrying me. On the off chance that you haven't got anything better to do."

She bites her lip. "Do you know, Narvin," she says, "that wasn't altogether terrible."

"I try," he says, dryly.

"It may even have been competent enough that I won't be forced to refuse on principle."

"How generous of you."

"Though I was surprised you didn't go the traditional High Gallifreyan route. That's not at all like you."

"Is that what it'll take to get you to give me an actual answer?"

"Oh, Narvin, please don't."

"My Lady Romanadvoratrelundar, Lord President of the High Council of Time Lords, Imperiatrix of Gallifrey and all her dominions..."

"I know who I am, you don't need to..."

"...heir to the House of Heartshaven, custodian of the House of Dvora, keeper of the Rod and the Sash and the Coronet..."

"...Narvin, _really_..."

"...I, Narvindrasterienableth, heir to the House of Asterion..."

"Yes, yes, all right, yes!" she says, laughing. "I'll do anything you like, if only you'll stop with the titles."

"Even marry me?" he asks, as her nose brushes against his.

"Even that," she says, "though only just to save myself from any more such torture."

"I can live with that," he says, and then they're kissing each other. From a purely technical perspective, he supposes it would be better if one of them could manage to stop smiling, but under the circumstances, he wouldn't have it any other way.

"You realize, making it official _will_ mean some changes for you," she points out, when they come up for air.

"Increased security isn't any particular bother."

"Oh, not just that. While we're on the subject of titles, you'll be saddled with a whole _host_ of those. Do you realize that everyone will have to call you 'Your Excellency?'"

He stares at her. "You're joking. Please, tell me you're joking."

"Not in the slightest," she grins. "I'm not surprised you didn't know; there hasn't been a First Time Lord of Gallifrey for millennia. But I'm afraid the edicts are _quite_ specific on that point."

"I take it back," he says, dismally. "I'm sorry, Romana, but even you aren't worth being Excellencied all the time."

"Too late now," she laughs. "You ought to have thought of that _before_ you proposed, oughtn't you?"

"Couldn't you change the law?" he pleads.

"What?" she asks, mockingly aghast. "The ancient, _sacred_ law of Gallifrey? Why, Narvin, I'm _shocked_ you'd even suggest such a thing."

"You are a cruel, cruel woman, Romanadvoratrelundar."

She grins, pushes him onto his back, and swings her legs up to sit above him. "It's one of your favorite things about me."

"I have quite a number of favorite things about you," he says, leaning up to kiss her stomach.

"Don't go listing them, Narvin. If I wanted flattery, I would have taken up with Brax instead."

"Do you want me to insult you, then?"

She slides her hips towards his feet and cranes her neck down, so she can nibble at his neck. "I want you to tell me honestly when you think I'm wrong, and never to sugarcoat anything. Then I won't ever feel like I shouldn't do the same," she says, and when he turns his head to kiss her jaw, she turns hers, too, so their lips meet. "And it does make the times when you think I'm spectacular that much more perfect."

"I think I can promise that," he says, smiling against her mouth. "But Romana..."

"Hmmm?"

"You do know I always think you're spectacular, don't you." It isn't a question.

"I had a sneaking suspicion," she says, and interrupts herself with another kiss. "But Narvin?"

"Yes?"

"Don't tell anyone, and do try not to let it go to your head," says Romana, "but at certain rare moments, when all the stars just happen to be in alignment, I'm not entirely disinclined to think that it's possible you might be just a little bit spectacular yourself."

"As your CIA Coordinator, Madam President," says Narvin, smiling at her the way only she has ever made him smile, "I can categorically assure you that your secret is safe with me."

*

The morning after the Battle of Arcadia, the Lady President is a few microspans later than usual in arriving at command central. The gossip mill of Gallifrey is a well-oiled machine, and there isn't a Time Lord or Lady in the Presidential Complex who couldn't wager a very shrewd guess as to what the Lady Romanadvoratrelundar has been doing with her morning, and with whom. But that doesn't stop every face in the room swiveling to watch as she walks in, every eye noting the becoming flush of her cheeks, and the tiny hint of a smirk at the corner of Coordinator Narvin's mouth, and the press of his hand, gentle but proprietorial, to the small of her back.

"That's quite enough gawping," says the Madam President, not entirely without a smile. She and Narvin cross to the center of the room, and slide in between Chancellor Braxiatel and Adviser Leela around the map table at the center of the room. "Back to work, everyone," she says, looking at each of the three faces around her in turn, and then back at the universe, spread out before them. "We've got a war to win."


End file.
